


Learning to Walk (So That We Can Run)

by ricekrispyjoints



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Betaed, Domestic Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Frottage, Hand Jobs, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Light Angst, M/M, Oikawa Tooru's Knee Injury, Physical Therapy, Roommates, Sloppy Makeouts, Slow Build, Surgery, gosh i'm so embarrassed, if it can be called that, the mama iwa-chan is so strong
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-10
Updated: 2015-12-10
Packaged: 2018-05-05 22:49:05
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 27,639
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5393144
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ricekrispyjoints/pseuds/ricekrispyjoints
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"I'm not healing like I should be."</p><p>In his second year of university, physical therapy just isn't cutting it. Oikawa's knee is getting worse, and he can't hide it anymore. </p><p>Or: the light angst, project-your-own-life-experiences-on-Oikawa knee surgery fic you didn't know you wanted.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Learning to Walk (So That We Can Run)

**Author's Note:**

> Beta'd by my one and only cloudmonstachopper-- I've dragged u so far into iwaoi hell tbh... and i'm not sorry
> 
> A lot of the anecdotes are based on my own experience with PT, knee surgery, and recovering, and yes-- making out with month-old surgical incisions on your knee. (Not as easy as it looks.)
> 
> This was very cathartic to write for me, so I hope you enjoy it.

“I think it’s time we talk about other options,” Yamada, Oikawa’s on again off again physical therapist since he entered university last year, tells him. 

They’ve just finished a very basic session: warm up on the stationary bike for five minutes, stretching, a little soft tissue massage, and muscle training with the easiest exercise bands. It hadn’t gone well. His pedaling was uneven, favoring his left leg over his injured right; his muscles were so tender to the touch that Yamada could barely do any of his treatments without a hushed curse from Oikawa.

 Sitting on the exam table in his workout clothes, Oikawa glares at his knee, an ugly, swollen thing that dangles uselessly over the edge.

“It’s no worse than normal,” Oikawa insists, but his voice cracks on the lie. “Just hook me up to the magic stim machine with some ice, and I’ll be good as new!”

 “Oikawa-san, please listen. You’ve been coming to me for over a year now for the same condition, and you said it bothered you in high school, too. If anything, it’s getting worse. I really think it’s time to see a specialist. There may be something surgical they can—“

“Oh, no, no, no, no,” Oikawa says, holding his arms up in an ‘X’ across his chest. “I can’t have surgery; they’ll kick me off the team. No way.”

Oikawa has worked too hard to make his university team’s first string, and he’s damned if he’s going to give that up for some stupid surgery.

“Depending on what’s wrong with it, they may be able to treat it with steroid injections, but until we get some imaging done, we don’t know what’s going on.”

“What about more frequent physical therapy?” Oikawa bargains. “I always feel better after a session with you.”

“That could help, but it’s not going to fix this. I want to see you better and healthy, not just suffering through it. Please, see the specialist. I’ll get you the referral form while you ice and stim.”

Yamada excuses himself to get the paperwork to see an orthopedic surgeon, and Oikawa is left on the blue vinyl table to stare at his knee.

One of Yamada’s assistants (and former Karasuno manager, Oikawa recalls) Shimizu, wheels the little stim cart over to Oikawa’s table. First, she props his legs up on a cushion, and then finds the stim pads with his name on them and applies all four of them: two above and two below his knee, to the left and to the right of his patella. Then, she snaps the wires into the pads and sets to wrapping a heavy ice pack wrapped in a white pillowcase around his knee, securing it with an ace bandage.

Finally, she presses a few buttons and Oikawa begins to feel the stir of the tiny, buzzing vibrations in each of the stim pads.

“Tell me when it’s high enough,” Shimizu says as she turns up the stim machine slowly.

Oikawa says “now” when he feels his muscles begin to involuntarily tense and spasm, the electric impulses pulsing deep into his leg. The ice is almost too cold against his skin, but he’d rather it go completely numb today: if he can’t feel it, it doesn’t hurt, and if it doesn’t hurt, he can pretend it’s not destroying his life.

His chest feels tight as he lies there, debating between pulling his phone out and just trying to nap for the next twenty minutes.

At this point, he’s fairly certain that as soon as he gets home, he’s going to cry like a baby, but he doesn’t care.

Biting his lip to keep the tears in, he crosses his arms and digs his fingernails into his forearms.

This knee—this stupid, awful, _fucking piece of shit_ knee is—

 “Here’s the letter,” Yamada says, returning to Oikawa’s table, showing Oikawa where he places it on Oikawa’s bag. “I stapled our recommended orthopedist’s business card to it, too, so give them a call. Appointments fill up fast, so the sooner you call, the better.”

Oikawa nods in response.

“Thank you, Yamada-sensei,” he says as politely as he can muster to the man who seems to be trying to sign his volleyball career’s death sentence.

When the stim machine clicks off, he unwinds the bandages himself, trying to get the burning cold ice off his skin.

Shimizu hurries over to remove the stim pads, sticking them back on their plastic sheet, and he thanks her for her help.

He hobbles outside to the train station just across the street, pulling his cellphone out to text Iwa-chan.

When he has the contact pulled up, though, he hesitates. He doesn’t want Iwaizumi to know, for some reason. Well, he _wants_ to complain to him about how unfair it all is, and how his knee is such garbage, and how he hates his body for this and every other betrayal.

But he doesn’t want Iwaizumi to know that he’s in pain—in _this much_ pain. Oikawa is kind of whiny, and Iwaizumi certainly shoulders the brunt of that as his best friend and now roommate. But this isn’t whining: it’s deep, terrifying, pain and fear.

He can’t let Iwaizumi know that he’s suffering immensely not only physically, but emotionally. He’s terrified that he’ll never play sports again, that he might not even _walk_ normally again. Hell, they live in a third floor walk-up; how is he supposed to get to his own home?

He’ll be forced to move out, find some weirdo roommate on Craig’s List to split the rent with, and live out the rest of his days as a hand model or something where he doesn’t have to use his pitiful leg ever again.

Oikawa knows he’s sinking into panic-mode fast, but he can’t help it. His mind is racing with worst-case scenarios, and he’s considering what life would be like as an amputee when his phone rings.

“Hey, hey, hey!” Bokuto’s enthusiastic voice crackles through the phone. “What are you up to, Oikawa?”

“Headed home, actually,” he says with as much of his usual cheer as he can muster. It’s not much.

“Cool, cool. So listen, Kuroo let me borrow his notes from English this morning, but his handwriting is a nightmare. Could I maybe borrow yours instead?”

“I’m not on campus anymore,” Oikawa says, “but if you want to drop by my apartment, you can copy them there. I’ll be home in twenty.”

He feels exhausted, and sort of regrets inviting Bokuto over, even if it is for academic reasons. Bokuto is a bit easily distracted, and Oikawa is not in the mood for his exuberance tonight. Maybe he can make Iwa-chan kick him out…

“Great! Thank you so much, Oikawa! I knew I could count on you and your adorable handwriting! I’ll see you soon!”

Bokuto hangs up, and Oikawa sighs. The train pulls into the station, and he boards. There aren’t any seats available, but a girl about his age sees his knee brace and the grimace on his face and gives up her seat for him.

He wants to refuse, to pretend that he doesn’t need it, but he does. He thanks her quietly and sinks into the seat.

The train ride is quick and quiet. When he arrives at his stop, he does his best to walk as normally as possible, training his features and clenching his fists to even out his gait. He doesn’t want Iwaizumi to know how bad it is.

Iwaizumi knows it’s bad as soon as the word “tadaima” is out of Oikawa’s mouth.

“What happened?” he asks.

“Bokuto’s coming over to copy my English notes,” Oikawa says, avoiding the question.

“Ok…” Iwaizumi says. “What’s wrong, though?”

Oikawa knows he’s a terrible liar in front of Iwaizumi, so he opts for evasion rather than deception. “Oh, nothing you need to worry about!” he says with false cheer.

He knows Iwaizumi will see through him. Part of him really _wants_ Iwaizumi to call him out. Oikawa is torn between wanting to spare his friend the drama and frustration of his knee problems and selfishly wanting a shoulder to cry on.

“You know that’s just going to make me worry more, dumbass.”

“Iwa-chan isn’t very good at listening, then!”

“I’d argue that my ability to interpret your bullshit counts as exceptional listening skills, but whatever you need to tell yourself…”

Oikawa flashes him a peace sign and wanders into the kitchen without the usual bounce in his step.

Iwaizumi notices.

“How was PT?” he asks pointedly.

“Iwa-chan, can’t it wait? I’m starving. Did you cook tonight?”

“I always cook when you have PT. Sometimes when you don’t. Speaking of, it’s been your turn to cook for the past like, three weeks.”

“But Iwa-chan is such a good chef that my cooking would be embarrassing! Iwa-chan should just do all the cooking.”

“That would be okay if I wasn’t already doing everything else around here,” Iwaizumi grumbles.

A wave of guilt floods Oikawa. He hasn’t been doing his share since his knee started acting up again. It takes all his energy and then some to get through volleyball practice. When he’s at home, he is very firmly _not interested_ in any activity that requires his knee. 

“Hey, I do both of our laundry,” Oikawa gripes, trying to assuage his guilt as he plucks a Tupperware out of the fridge. “Iwa-chan’s clothes need an extra rinse cycle. Yikes.”

“Oh, good, one single chore. Do you want a medal?”

“Don’t be ungrateful, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says, prying the lid off the leftovers and sticking the box in the microwave.

While it’s heating up, he goes to his room to change into fresh pajamas—long sweatpants to hide the horrible ugliness of his knee.

He toddles back into the kitchen just as the microwave dings. There’s a knock at the door directly after, and Oikawa is visibly torn between his food and his friend at the door, looking woefully between the two.  

“Get your food, dumbass. I’ll let Bokuto in,” Iwaizumi says with a chuckle.

Oikawa takes his food out and grabs a pair of chopsticks from the drying rack. He’s fairly sure neither of them ever actually puts dishes away; they just help themselves from the drying rack, eat, toss them in the sink, wash them, and put them back in the drying rack.

It works.

Oikawa makes his way to the kitchen table, where Bokuto is taking out his English notebook.

“Seriously, thanks again for this, Oikawa,” Bokuto says enthusiastically.

“It’s no problem,” Oikawa says, waving him off. He sits with his food and is about to take a mouthful of steaming rice when he realizes Bokuto is staring at him expectantly.

His notebook is in his backpack, which is still sagging by the door from when he got home.

The door, all the way across the room.

His knee protests as he pushes his chair back, but suddenly warm hands are on his shoulders.

“I got it,” Iwaizumi says softly. “You eat your food.”

Oikawa scoots his chair back up to the table, simultaneously relieved that he doesn’t have to get up and ashamed that Iwaizumi had to get his bag for him.

Bokuto watches the exchange with a curious expression on his face, and Oikawa can practically feel the question bubbling out of his mouth.

He stuffs his face with food.

“Jesus, Oikawa! I know you said you were hungry, but can you try actually chewing instead of inhaling your food?” Iwaizumi scolds, setting Oikawa’s bag on the floor next to his chair.

“Why are you so hungry?” Bokuto asks.

“I forgot my lunch at home today, and I’ve been on campus since 8:30,” Oikawa explains when he’s swallowed enough food to talk.

“That’s not good!” Bokuto says, shaking his head disapprovingly.  “You gotta eat regularly to stay healthy and in top shape for volleyball, you know.”

Oikawa purses his lips as he leans over to dig out his own English notebook. “Here,” he says, shoving it at Bokuto.

Oikawa doesn’t want to think about being in “top shape for volleyball,” he wants to forget that his knee is falling apart and taking his dreams down with it.

For perhaps the first time in his life, Oikawa Tooru does _not_ want to think about volleyball.

Bokuto must sense Oikawa’s sour mood, because he sets to copying down the notes quickly and quietly.

Oikawa finishes his meal in silence and pushes back from the table. “Just leave the notebook on the table when you’re done. Iwa-chan can show you out when you’re finished. I’m going to bed.”

Iwaizumi looks startled, brow furrowing as he sweeps his gaze up and down Oikawa’s tired body.

 _Shit_ , Oikawa thinks. _He’s not gonna drop it._

“Good night, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says, meeting Iwaizumi’s gaze defiantly.

He walks as proudly as he can to his bedroom, closes the door, and collapses onto his bed with a silent sob.

 

*

 

Oikawa wakes the next morning to a weight dipping his mattress and a hand brushing through his bangs.

He blinks the bleariness out of his eyes and mumbles something incoherent.

“Morning, sunshine,” Iwaizumi says with a soft smile. “How’d you sleep?”

 _Like shit,_ Oikawa wants to say. “Fine.”

“Liar.”

“Then why’d you even ask?” Oikawa pouts.

“Because I wanted to see if you were gonna be honest with me or not. Apparently not. So are you gonna tell me what happened at PT yesterday to make you so pissy, or do I have to force it out of you?”

“It’s too early for you to be this violent,” Oikawa gripes.

“Well then start talking.”

Oikawa takes a deep breath, and sits up. He takes his time propping his back against his pillows, carefully drawing his knees up toward his chest.

“Yamada is sending me to a specialist,” he says finally.

“I thought Yamada _was_ the specialist,” Iwa-chan says, confused.

“He’s a physical therapist, yeah. But he wants me to see an orthopedist,” Oikawa says, and he can feel his voice start to shake with impending sobs. “He says they need to run some tests because I’m not healing like I should be.”

Iwaizumi is silent, like he’s waiting for more information. Oikawa doesn’t want to say it—like saying “surgery” will jinx things somehow—and so he sits in silence.

“What kind of tests?” Iwaizumi asks finally.

“X-Rays, MRI… that kind of thing.”

“So he’s not sure of the diagnosis?”

“I guess so.” Oikawa looks resolutely at his cuticles and not Iwaizumi’s face.

They sit quietly for a couple more minutes, before Iwaizumi slaps his hands on his thighs and stands abruptly.

“If your PT says to get images done, get them done. It’ll help them treat you better, heal you faster. Call this morning,” he says in a tone that leaves no room for argument.

Oikawa bites his lip.

He wants to make a quip about Iwa-chan being such a mom, but he’s not in the mood for his usual teasing.

Besides, Iwaizumi is right. If he waits, he’ll just worry himself sick, and maybe the images will show nothing is wrong after all, and…

No. It’s useless to think like that. There’s very clearly _something_ wrong. His best hope is to find out what it is and get it treated as quickly as possible.

He’s scared.

“Alright,” he agrees, though his voice wavers.

“I’ve got to go to class, but I made your bento so don’t fucking forget it again,” Iwaizumi says with a raised eyebrow and a smirk.

“Iwa-chan takes such good care of me!” Oikawa smiles, perking up.

“Yeah, yeah, get your shitty knee better and then it’s time to return the favor.”

Iwaizumi leaves, closing the door gently behind him, and Oikawa wriggles back down into his bed.

Everything feels so far away: breakfast is in the kitchen, the number for the specialist is in his backpack, the bathroom is all the way down the hall… His knee is already aching and it’s only seven thirty.

Eventually, he drags himself out of bed, propping himself on the couch with an ice pack and the business card from Yamada. He fidgets with the card for a solid fifteen minutes before he shakes his head at himself and pulls out his phone.

By some stroke of luck, the orthopedist’s office has an imaging appointment for that very afternoon, after Oikawa’s art history lecture.

He can’t help but feel like he’s scheduling his own execution.

He manages to feed himself a simple breakfast, packs his bento into his bag, and yanks the Velcro straps on his knee brace as hard as he can, like the pressure will somehow just hold everything together.

It’s worth a shot, at least.

 

*

 

The x-ray is uncomfortable. He has to stand, hold his knee at certain angles, put his full weight on it, and hold completely still until the technician tells him he can relax. It’s agony.

The MRI is better; they give him a pair of headphones hooked up to a Pandora radio station and all he has to do is lay still under the thin blanket while the machine clicks and bangs and makes all sorts of weird sounds for half an hour.

When it’s done, the technician tells him he’s free to go home, and that he’ll get a call in a day or two with the results.

He’s in a foul mood as he traipses back to campus for his second lecture of the day. He normally doesn’t mind algebra, but right now it’s the absolute last thing he wants to do. His knee hurts, and he’s already maxed out on doses of pain-relievers for the next four hours.

The hour passes slowly, Oikawa barely able to absorb what’s going on around him. The only thing he’s aware of is his fingers kneading the tender flesh around his kneecap, trying to relieve even a fraction of the discomfort.  

He meets up with Iwaizumi after the lecture, and they take the train home together.

Neither of them mentions the trip to the specialist until they’re home in their apartment.

Oikawa slumps onto the couch, propping his feet up on the coffee table, wincing slightly as he jars his knee a bit.

“Did you—“

“They’ll call me with the results in a day or two,” Oikawa interjects.

“Oh, that was fast.”

“There was a cancellation. It was fine.”

“Have you told your parents?”

“They’ll see the bill,” Oikawa says stubbornly, crossing his arms across his chest.

“Shittykawa, call your parents!”

“And tell them _what,_ exactly?” Oikawa cries, bursting into tears.

“Shit,” Iwaizumi whispers. He sits down on the couch next to Oikawa, and they instinctively curl into each other.

Iwaizumi cards his fingers through Oikawa’s hair, strokes his back as he sobs.

 

They’ve been here before: in their second year of high school, the first time his knee caused him any problems. At first, he thought he had just tweaked it funny on the landing of his jump serve. He iced it, stretched out, and figured it would get back to normal soon enough.

When a week passed by and nothing had changed, Oikawa started to worry. He bought the knee brace, did everything the athletic trainer told him to. There was no way for him to know at that point that it would escalate into a full-blown Problem.

Two weeks went by, and though it was less swollen and painful, it still bothered him. He decided it was easy enough to treat with a little ice, the brace, and pain-killers, so he said it was fine and carried on.

By the third week, though, Iwaizumi knew something was still wrong.

“Y’know, you should probably wash that knee brace if you’re gonna be wearing it so much. It probably smells disgusting.”

“I won’t have to wear it much longer, so it’s fine,” Oikawa says as casually as he can.

“You said that when you bought it. How long has it been?”

“It’s fine. I’m just wearing it in case,” Oikawa tells him.

“In case what? In case it’s not actually better?”

“In case I… in case I hurt it again.”

 They’re quiet for a moment.

“Does it still hurt?” Iwaizumi asks gently.

Oikawa looks at him with tear-filled eyes. “… Yes.”

“You need to see a doctor, Oikawa,” Iwaizumi tells him.

“N-no! I can’t! Coach won’t let me play!”

“You won’t be _able_ to play if this gets much worse!” Iwaizumi shoots back.

Oikawa bursts into tears.

“Well, shit,” Iwaizumi says, and pulls Oikawa into a hug.

After that, Oikawa goes to the doctor, and begins seeing a physical therapist twice a week.

 

 

Three years later, and Oikawa feels like the same terrified kid he was in high school.

“I’m so scared,” he chokes out after a few minutes.

“I know. It’s okay to be scared. But you’re gonna get through this, I promise.”

“My parents only let me come to Tokyo because I got a scholarship, I was gonna go pro, I was gonna…” his speech devolves back into hiccupping sobs, and Iwaizumi just holds him tighter.

When Oikawa is all cried out, they pull apart without a word. With a final squeeze, Iwaizumi shuffles over to the kitchen to start on dinner, and Oikawa pulls out his art history textbook and a highlighter, settling in to get some studying done.

Over dinner, they try to keep the conversation light; Oikawa rambles about a UFO documentary he wants to watch, and Iwaizumi argues that it’s not a ‘documentary’ if all the evidence is fake and aliens aren’t real.

It almost feels normal, except for the tightness in his chest and the constant, radiating ache of his knee.

 

*

 

The orthopedist’s office calls on Wednesday that the results are in, and that he needs to come into the office to speak with the doctor about them.

Oikawa puts on a brave face to schedule the appointment, even though his mind is jumping to all of the worst possible conclusions: that he has some rare disease that’s destroyed his leg; he’s so broken that the receptionist can’t even tell him over the phone; they’re going to amputate his leg…

“Sir?” the receptionist asks.

“Oh, yes! I’m still here.”

“So you’re all set for tomorrow morning at 10am with Doctor Terushima.”

“Thank you.”

He hangs up the phone and flops onto his pillows, both arms spread out in some kind of effort to breathe.

It’s not really helping. 

Forcing his lungs to draw in enough air, he lifts his phone again to send a message to Iwaizumi.

_You’re free at 10am tomorrow, right?_

Oikawa knows he isn’t—he has a biology lecture, he thinks—but it was the first available appointment, and frankly the not-knowing feels like it’s eroding his insides with acid.

He growls in frustration, digs the palms of his hands into his eyes. He’s being a shitty friend, but he needs Iwaizumi for this.

He lies on his bed for a few more minutes, waiting for Iwaizumi to respond, breathing heavily and silently hurling every swearword he knows at his offending limb.

Finally, his phone buzzes.

_I am if you need me._

That almost makes it worse, Oikawa thinks. But right now, he doesn’t care. He’ll be selfish, he’ll be obnoxious and shove his problems onto Iwaizumi.

He feels like a little kid who just wants their Mommy, except he wants his Iwa-chan.

It’s sort of pathetic, but Oikawa decides that he doesn’t care. He’s in pain, he’s scared, and he would do the same for Iwaizumi in a heartbeat.

He quashes the guilt down as far as he can, and pulls out his algebra homework.

 

*

 

The orthopedist’s office smells stale, the waiting room populated by a few elderly people, and a very sour looking woman holding crutches. A muted television with closed captioning shows some horribly boring-looking daytime talk show.

It’s so quiet that Oikawa feels like even his breathing is too loud.

After he’s signed in, the receptionist hands him a complicated form on a clipboard and asks him to fill it out.

Personal information, insurance information, medical history, family history… Oikawa barely knows some of the answers, resorting to guessing about whether or not anyone in his family had had glaucoma or not.

Beside him, Iwaizumi has picked up an old issue of some sports magazine from the side table and is flipping through an article about cross-training. 

After the form is complete, Oikawa makes to stand and return it to the receptionist, but Iwaizumi snatches it out of his hands and gives him a dirty look.

When Iwaizumi returns to his seat, they kill time by guessing what brought the other patients in. Oikawa imagines a man in a sling fell off a ladder trying to clean his chandelier, while Iwaizumi suggests the sour-crutch-lady had been so busy glaring at everyone that she got hit by a bicyclist.

They smirk quietly, not quite laughing, but it’s somehow a relief to imagine freak accidents and things happening to _other people and not Oikawa._

When they run out of other patients, they begin making up backstories for the reception staff, and the male nurse who comes out now and then to call back a new patient with the most disinterested tone Oikawa has ever heard.

It feels like _years_ that they wait there, but eventually, a nurse calls Oikawa’s name and he jolts in his chair.

Iwaizumi—strong, steady Iwaizumi—stands first, extending his hand to help Oikawa up. Oikawa grits his teeth and pushes himself up out of the chair with his left hand while he grips Iwaizumi’s with his right.

Iwaizumi lets him walk to the exam room on his own, but he’s right there, just in case.

Oikawa feels like vomiting.

The nurse asks about his medical history briefly: when did the injury occur, describe the pain, what treatments have helped, and so on, before saying that the doctor would be with him shortly.

They wait again.

Finally, there’s a light rapping at the door, and the doctor enters in a light blue-grey medical coat, with a manila file that has x-ray prints sticking out of the ends.

“Good morning, Oikawa-san,” the doctor says kindly with a gentle bow. “I’m Doctor Terushima.”

“Nice to meet you, Terushima-sensei,” Oikawa replies, bowing in kind. Eyes darting to Iwa-chan, he adds, “this is my friend, Iwaizumi Hajime. I asked him to come with me today. For, um, support.”

Terushima nods at Iwaizumi and then sits on the small stool.

“Well, let’s get to it, shall we? Images first, and then I’d like to take a look at your knee.”

He slides the first two x-ray films onto a white lightbox, flipping the switch to illuminate the image.

“So, good news is, the x-rays are clean,” he says, gesturing vaguely to the glowing outline of Oikawa’s bones. He yanks the films off the lightbox, and turns the light off.

“The MRI, however, not so much.” Terushima opens a laptop and clicks around until he finds the angle he wants.

“So this is your knee—right here’s the patella, that’s your knee cap, and over here we have the ACL, some cartilage, and _here_ ”—he smacks the laptop screen with the pen he’s pointing with—“is the problem. So good news, bad news. Bad news is, your meniscus is torn almost straight through.”

Oikawa feels the blood drain from his face. He instinctively reaches for Iwaizumi, who accepts his hand and lets Oikawa squeeze as hard as he needs to.

Terushima scrolls through a few different angles, and the tear is so obvious that even Oikawa’s and Iwaizumi’s untrained eyes can see it.

“Over here, we’ve got a bursa—that’s a fluid sac, basically—that’s formed. It’s a side-effect of the torn meniscus, but it’s causing more inflammation and pressure on your tendons. Have you noticed it? The back of your knee on the left-side is probably more tender than other places. Am I right?”

Oikawa feels around at his knee and winces. He nods dumbly.

“Um, you said there was good news to this, too,” Iwaizumi prods gently.

“Oh, yes of course. A torn meniscus is very easy to fix. Minimally-invasive, fairly quick recovery as far as surgery goes, too.”

Oikawa inhales sharply at the word “surgery.”

Iwaizumi squeezes his hand reassuringly, stroking his thumb over the back of Oikawa’s hand.

“Are there… alternatives to surgery?” Iwaizumi asks.

“For a tear this big and that’s causing so much discomfort? None that are going to be very effective, and certainly not long-term solutions. Your form said that you’re a college athlete?”

“Y-yes,” Oikawa manages.

“Without surgery, your competitive sports days are over. We’re talking lazy bike rides for your exercise.”

Oikawa hates how _weak_ he feels in this moment: tears welling, unable to speak up for himself, forcing his friend to ditch a lecture to literally hold his hand through this appointment.

“But as I said, the surgery is minimally invasive, and is a very routine procedure. Not to say it doesn’t have any risk, because any surgery will, but it’s much safer than say, total knee replacement.”

Oikawa blanches again, but puts the hand that’s not clutching Iwa-chan’s on his stomach, and forces himself to take a deep, steadying breath. 

“Perhaps you could… tell us more about the procedure? What he can expect, the recovery…?” Iwaizumi asks.

 _He’s so good at this, and I’m over here gasping like a fish just to stop myself from breaking down into hysterics_ , Oikawa scolds himself.  

The doctor explains that they will make three small incisions: one on the outer side of his knee, two on the inner part. They’ll insert the scope in one, and the tools in the other two. They’ll trim out the torn section of his meniscus, clean up any frayed cartilage they may see, and then sew him up.

“As I said, it’s very routine, and based on how clear the image is on your MRI, it should be no problem to find.”

Oikawa finds himself nodding, but he feels blank. 

“After… How long until he can play again?” Iwaizumi asks, voice soft.

“Typically, we expect a patient to be walking unassisted about two weeks after the procedure, physical therapy twice a week to build up strength and range of motion… Everyone is different, but he can probably start light, low-impact training in about two to four months. It’ll be at least six months before he can get back into competitive training, jumping, running, things like that.”

Oikawa feels the doctor’s words wash over him, like the cold water of an ocean tide rushing up to shock his skin and receding away into the distance.

He hates that they’re talking _about_ him while he’s right there, but he’s useless. Utterly useless. He stares at the floor, replaying _“at least six months”_ over and over in his head.

Iwaizumi elbows him gently, bringing him back to the present.

“Oi, are you paying attention?”

“Six months,” Oikawa whispers.

“Would you rather be out for six months or the rest of your life?” Iwaizumi snaps. “Stop treating this like the end of the world, Oikawa. Dr Terushima said he can fix this, and you’re going to heal. Let’s look on the positive side, yeah?”

“Sound advice, Iwaizumi-san,” Dr Terushima says, scribbling something on Oikawa’s chart. “Now, I’d like to do a quick physical exam just to test out if there are any other areas for concern.”

Oikawa hauls himself out of the chair and makes for the exam table.

Dr Terushima pulls out a low stool with a bar attached and asks Oikawa to step up onto the stool as normally as he can. He leans heavily on the bar for support, grimacing as he pushes up with his right leg. The doctor puts his fingers into the divots on his knee, one on either side of his kneecap, then instructs Oikawa to step back down.

Then he has to do it on his good leg.

“Lie on the table please,” Dr Terushima instructs, and Oikawa slowly complies.

The doctor pushes and pulls at his leg, asks Oikawa to push against or resist his hand, flex this or that muscle, and every time the doctor digs his fingers into Oikawa’s painfully tender knee.

“Sorry this hurts so much, but it’s by finding the pain that we know what’s wrong.”

“I’m fine. I can handle a little pain,” Oikawa grits.

“Spoken like a true athlete,” Dr Terushima teases lightly. “Alright, I think that’s enough torture. Now, I strongly recommend a pair of crutches to help keep some of that weight off of your knee. You don’t have to use them if you’re not in too much pain, but I want you to have them if you need them.”

Oikawa’s face falls as the doctor pages a nurse to bring him a pair of crutches.

The nurse enters with two pairs of crutches.

“How tall are you, Oikawa-san?” she asks. “This pair goes up to 180cm, and this one is the taller pair. But depending on how long your arms are, you may prefer the shorter pair. Shall we try them out?”

Oikawa gingerly climbs off the exam table and lets the nurse adjust the crutches to where she thinks would be a suitable height. He tests out the taller pair first, but decides that they’re just _slightly_ too tall.

“It’s because all your height’s in that absurd neck of yours,” Iwaizumi teases.

“Mean, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa snaps on reflex, and just uttering the familiar line brings a sense of comfort he hasn’t felt in weeks.

Iwaizumi smiles softly for just a moment, long enough for Oikawa to see it before it dissolves again into a concerned sort of pout as he watches the nurse hand Oikawa the shorter crutches.

They’re extended to the tallest setting, but they don’t ride up into his armpits so awfully, and they all agree they fit best.

Dr Terushima hands Oikawa’s chart to Iwaizumi, since Oikawa’s hands are now occupied with the crutches. “When you’re ready, take this up to my receptionist, Hamada-san. If you’re not ready to schedule the surgery, just let her know and then you can call and set up a time.”

Oikawa is still a bit dazed, but he manages to thank the doctor.

“Take it easy on those crutches at first, okay? We’ll hear from you soon, Oikawa-san.”

 

*

 

After a lot of squabbling, Oikawa agrees to call his parents that evening after classes. He _desperately_ doesn’t want to tell them what’s going on. He knows how disappointed they’re going to be; how angry they’ll get. What if they tell him to come home? That he can’t stay at school in Tokyo? The mere thought is enough to bring back the tears, and Iwaizumi does his best to be stern and supportive at the same time.

(This involves a lot of swearing and name calling and gentle headlocks.)

“Do you want me in the room while you call?” Iwaizumi asks as Oikawa stares at his phone on the couch.

He’s got his leg propped on every pillow they own, an ice pack secured to his knee with an ace bandage like Shimizu does for him at PT.

“No,” Oikawa says, straightening his posture. “I need to do this myself.”

“Okay,” Iwaizumi says. “I’ll be in my room studying then. Holler if you need anything.”

“Thanks, Iwa-chan.”

When Oikawa hears the quiet _snk_ of Iwaizumi’s door closing, he closes his eyes and presses the call button for his parents.

As expected, his mother picks up after only two rings.

“Tooru!” she croons. “To what do I owe the pleasure of this call from my only son who never speaks to me anymore now that he’s run off to the big city?”

She’s teasing, but it only makes his chest feel tighter. He wants to play it off, tease back that she has another child, why doesn’t she bother his sister instead? But he’s just so tired, he doesn’t think he has it in him.

“It’s uh, it’s not really a pleasant phone call,” he begins awkwardly.

“Oh, Tooru, don’t tell me you’re in trouble on the team! Aren’t you getting along with your senpai?”

“It’s not like that, mom. It’s… it’s my knee.”

His mother is silent.

“Mom?” he asks.

“What’s wrong with your knee,” she asks. Her voice has turned cold, level, calculating. Oikawa can almost see her face: her eyes dark and brooding, her features perfectly trained in a mask of carefully controlled disappointment.

(He hasn’t seen that face since he broke his sister’s arm in a sledding accident when he was seven.)

He takes a deep breath before he can speak. “My physical therapist Yamada-sensei was worried about my progress. He sent me to have an MRI and—“

“And how much is that going to cost?” she interrupts. “Why is this the first we’re hearing of this? It sounds like you’ve already done that, what sort of horrible news are you about to spring on me now? _‘Hi mom, I haven’t talked to you in weeks but can I have a few million yen for a very expensive nap that prints a picture of my leg?’”_

“Mom, please let me explain everything first,” Oikawa pleads.

She inhales sharply, and lets the breath out in an impatient huff. “Fine. I’m listening.”

“So the MRI came back and I have a, uh, torn meniscus? It’s… pretty bad. The doctor said that it can only be fixed through surgery, or I’ll never play volleyball again. Considering I can barely even walk right now…”

His mother is silent for a moment. “Is that all?”

Oikawa furrows his brow, confused. “Y-yes?”

“So what you’re saying is that you’ve been going to physical therapy for months and it has all been for naught because you needed surgery this whole time.”

“Yes, but we didn’t know that and –“

“And now you need this surgery, which is going to be a huge financial burden for us.”

“I know mom, I’m sorry. When I’m healed, I can get a job and pay you back, or—“

“Tooru, my precious boy. Why didn’t you _tell_ us this was all going on?”

Tears well up in his eyes when his answer comes. “Because I wanted to keep playing. I didn’t want to miss a single play. I _needed_ to be on the court, mom, I—“

The waterworks turn on, and Oikawa knows it will be a long time before he can turn them off again.

“Tooru,” his mother scolds lightly. “You promised to take care of yourself. You said you were fine, and that you just needed a little extra conditioning. And now this? Why didn’t you tell us?”

“I was… I was scared that you’d make me come home,” Oikawa whispers.

“No, Tooru. I don’t think we could’ve made you leave if we tried. I just wish you had told us about this before now. We could have been saving for the surgery, finding you care sooner… I don’t like my baby to be hurting.”

“I’m sorry,” he sobs.

“Shh, what’s done is done. Are you having surgery in Tokyo, or do you want to come back home for it?”

“My doctor is here, so… Plus with crutches, I can still go to class. I won’t miss as much that way.”

“And Hajime-kun is taking care of you? He’s so rough with you sometimes,” his mother tuts.

“Iwa-chan has been perfect through all of this. He’s been really good to me, mom,” Oikawa says, his sobs coming more gently now.

He remembers the feel of Iwaizumi’s hand in his at the orthopedist’s office and swallows thickly.

“I’m glad, Tooru. You be good to him back, now. If he tells you to rest or eat or stop whining, you listen. Do you understand?”

“Yes, mom,” he says, a quiet, huffy laugh escaping through his tears.

“I’ll tell your father about this tonight, alright? You call if you need anything, and I expect updates.”

“Yes, mom.”

“I love you, Tooru.”

“Love you too, mom.”

 He hangs up the phone and a huge sigh of relief rushes out of his lungs.

He wipes the tears off his face, looking up at the ceiling like that will stop new ones from falling. It helps, a little, and after a few calming breaths, he gets up with the help of his crutches and hobbles to the bathroom.

He rinses off his face, splashing it with cold water and willing the redness to go away. He hates letting Iwaizumi see him like this, all gross and cried-out, even though lately it’s been a more and more frequent occurrence.

“Some things can’t be helped,” he tells himself quietly. He would rather Iwa-chan see him all ugly than not have him there at all.

Vaguely he wonders what he can do for Iwaizumi for all the support and assistance and stability he’s given Oikawa so far. It’s not like he can cook for him or do something physically.

 _If he tells you to rest or eat or stop whining, you listen,_ his mom had told him. It’s a start, but Oikawa knows that’s not enough.

He uses the toilet while he’s in there, figuring that he’s already walked all the way over here, he may as well do his best to prevent needing future trips for as long as possible.

When he leaves the bathroom, his breathing is almost back to normal and his face is more pink now than that awful, splotchy red.

He makes his way back toward the couch, but before he sits down, he glances at Iwaizumi’s still closed bedroom door. Leaning his crutches against the back of the couch, he walks over to Iwaizumi’s room, and knocks softly.

“Iwa-chan?” he calls, his voice cracking between whispering and talking.

He hears the squeak of Iwaizumi’s desk chair and then the door opens.

“Hey,” Iwaizumi says. “How’d it go?”

“Everything’s fine,” he says plainly, and he steps forward to wrap his arms around Iwaizumi’s torso.

As he nuzzles his face into Iwaizumi’s shoulder, Iwaizumi’s hands wrap around Oikawa almost instinctively, and he huffs a very quiet laugh.

“You’ve been quite the cuddle monster lately,” he says softly as he brings a hand up to stroke through Oikawa’s unusually messy brown curls.

“Sorry,” Oikawa says, but he doesn’t pull back or move.

“How about we sit down so you don’t strain your knee too much just for a hug, yeah?”

Oikawa takes this to mean they’ll move to the couch, but Iwaizumi just leads him to his bed. “Come take a nap with me,” he says, as though that explains everything.

He helps Oikawa get comfortable, propping his knee up with a pillow. Grabbing his phone, Iwaizumi slides into the single bed next to him.

“I’m gonna set an alarm because I have to get some more work done today.”

Oikawa hums in response, still a bit surprised that Iwaizumi is instigating this; usually it’s Oikawa who weasels his way into Iwaizumi’s arms.

Not that he’s complaining.

When Iwaizumi tucks them in, he slips an arm under Oikawa’s neck, pulling him in close.

Oikawa’s not sure, but he thinks Iwaizumi might be smelling his hair for all the deep breaths he’s taking.

“Iwa-chan?” Oikawa asks as his eyes drift closed.

“Hmm,” Iwaizumi grunts back.

“Thank you,” he says quietly. “I don’t… I don’t thank you enough. You’ve been so supportive through this mess, and… I just. I just want you to know how much it means to me.”

“I know, dumbass,” Iwaizumi says affectionately. “Someone’s gotta look after you.”

They fall silent for a few minutes, and Oikawa listens to Iwaizumi’s breath grow deep and even.

“I’m glad it’s you, Hajime.”

 

*

 

The next day, Oikawa calls the orthopedist’s office to schedule his surgery. He’ll need someone (Iwaizumi) to pick him up afterwards, so he makes sure to schedule it on a day where Iwaizumi only has one class.

Now that he has a date – Thursday morning, three weeks from now—he feels both more relieved and more scared than before. Suddenly it’s _real;_  it’s not just a possibility, it’s his future. 

Iwaizumi meets Oikawa in his lecture hall, takes his bookbag for him and watches Oikawa as he manages his crutches.

Oikawa whines that the crutches hurt his armpits and that they make everything so difficult – he can’t _hold_ anything!—but he’s gotten very good at maneuvering on them after just two days.

Iwaizumi half-heartedly yells at him to slow down so he doesn’t slip and bust his ass, but Oikawa is just so relieved to be able to _move_ after months of pretending he’s not in pain. Iwaizumi doesn’t really put in much effort to stop him.

As they near the gym, though, Oikawa starts to slow down. He doesn’t want to go in, doesn’t want to face his teammates and his coach to whom he’s been lying pretty heavily for a few weeks now at least.

He prays to the Powers that Be that the coach doesn’t kick him off the team, and that he doesn’t lose his scholarship.

“You ready?” Iwaizumi asks quietly, hiking Oikawa’s backpack up hire on his shoulder as it slips. “God, what do you have in here? It feels like a brick.”

“Psychology text book,” Oikawa murmurs absently.

“Come on, band-aid it.”

_Rip it off all in one go: don’t drag it out._

With a steadying breath, Oikawa nods, and Iwaizumi opens the door for him and he crutches his way into the gym.

Coach is already there, setting up and chatting with one of the assistant coaches.

When he hears the clacking of Oikawa’s crutches on the hard wood floors, though, he turns around.

“Good afternoon, Coach,” Iwaizumi says, clearing his throat.  

“Oikawa what the hell is this?” Coach says gruffly.

Plastering on the fakest smile Oikawa has ever produced, he holds one of his crutches with his underarm so he can gesture more freely.

“I saw my specialist,” Oikawa says, waving a hand dismissively. He can hear how tight his voice is, but if he doesn’t play this off then he’ll just burst into tears. He’s had enough crying for now.

“I take it he didn’t give you a clean bill of health,” Coach grunts.

“Not exactly,” Oikawa says as bashfully as he can muster. “But it’s all taken care of! I’ve got surgery in three weeks, then rehab, and before you know it I’ll be back and better than ever!”

Coach sighs heavily.

“What’s the diagnosis?”

“Torn meniscus. Almost clean through.”

“And they didn’t notice this in physical therapy?”

“Well, sometimes tears don’t need surgery,” he hedges. “But when I wasn’t healing as fast as they liked, they asked me to get some imaging done.”

“How long ago was that?”

“Um… a week? Not even, actually.”

Coach narrows his eyes and turns to Iwaizumi.

“Did you know about this?”

“I knew he was in pain,” Iwaizumi says, and Oikawa thinks he can see a flash of anger in his friend’s eyes. “But I didn’t feel it was my place to tell you, sir.”

“Iwa-chan helped me make appointments and get this taken care of faster,” Oikawa says, trying to defend his friend.

“Go get changed for practice, Iwaizumi.”

“Yes, sir,” Iwaizumi says, locking eyes with Oikawa.

“As for you,” he says turning back to Oikawa once Iwaizumi is out of reasonable earshot. “I want you at every practice, ass parked on this bench. You’re going to track stats in practice matches, teach strategy to the other first years. After your surgery, you will follow your doctor’s directions _exactly_. I know you practice more than you should sometimes, which is probably how it ended up nearly torn all the way through. If I find out that you’re moving even a little faster than instructed you can kiss your scholarship goodbye.”

Oikawa feels the blood drain out of his face, his spine turning icy cold.

“I won't have that kind of reckless disregard for personal health on this team,” Coach continues. “You wanna go pro, then you have to learn how to take care of yourself. Hell, even if you weren’t aiming for the pros, you can’t destroy your body. Are we understood?”

Oikawa purses his lips and nods firmly. “Yes, Coach.”

“Good. Now go sit. Have Suzuhara give you one of the stats reports for our upcoming opponent; tell me what you think while the team is doing warm-ups.”

“Yes, Coach.”

Oikawa clacks over to the bench, sitting down just as the first of his teammates come out of the locker room.

“Oikawa! What happened?” Kaga, one of the reserve middle blockers, asks.

“One too many falls,” he says with a big plastic grin.

“How long are you out for?” Suzuhara asks, handing him the stats report Coach asked for.

Oikawa takes it and leafs through it, trying to distract himself away from the question. “Somewhere around eight weeks,” he mumbles.

“Two whole months?” Kaga asks. “You’re gonna miss the big round robin tournament!”

“Well, the surgery’s not for another three weeks… It can’t be helped. But I’m going to do my best from the sidelines!”

“Well, feel better soon!” Kaga says with a look of such utter _pity_ that Oikawa almost wants to throw up.

As the rest of the team files out of the locker room, they approach Oikawa in little groups, so that he has to answer the same questions over and over again.

Iwaizumi keeps glancing over at him, but as soon as Oikawa notices him he looks away and pretends it never happened.

 _Annoying_ , Oikawa thinks.

As the team begins their warm up, Oikawa forces himself to read over the stats report to qualm the ache in his chest: he wants to be out there with the team. He _needs_ to be out there. He bounces his good leg impatiently on the bench.

After a few minutes, when the captain is leading stretches, Coach rejoins Oikawa.

“So, what are your thoughts?” he asks.

“They’re a solid team, but there doesn’t seem to be any outstanding players. Only two service aces, both by their jersey number six. They’ve allowed a whole lot more service aces from their opponents, though, which means that either receives or communication is weak, maybe both.”

As Oikawa continues to rattle off his impressions, the coach nods or adds his own comments.

It will never compare to being on the court, but at least he’s being useful.

Oikawa hates being useless.

 

*

 

The weeks drag by, his armpits are chafed and sore, but he has to admit that trying to walk on his knee _without_ them is worse, so he deals with it.

Well, “deals with it” perhaps gives him too much credit: Oikawa has whined so much that Iwaizumi looks about ready to strangle him given the first chance.

Two days before his surgery, Oikawa has collected all of his assignments for the classes he’ll miss. Coach has put him to work, crunching numbers, devising drills and identifying weaknesses in their own team to make them stronger.

Despite being younger than him, Oikawa has taken the team’s other setter under his wing. Takeshi is, to Oikawa’s chagrin, two centimeters taller, but a bit gangly, and wears sports goggles that remind Oikawa of that snotty blond kid from Karasuno.

Takeshi’s form is solid but nothing special, and Oikawa feels a bit guilty, but part of the reason he adopts Takeshi as his apprentice is because he doesn’t think Takeshi will be much competition for him. Sure, he wants to see him improve, but he’s years behind Oikawa, so he feels safe to teach.

The team is taking down the nets at the end of practice, when Oikawa stands to stretch.

“This bench is so uncomfortable,” he whines. “Do we have a chair or something I can sit in? I don’t think I can take sitting here for another three weeks.”

Coach barks a laugh. “Your knee is injured, not your ass. Suck it up, Oikawa.”

Iwaizumi must have overheard, because he’s laughing now too. “It’s called bench-warming, not chair-warming.”

“Mean, Iwa-chan! I’m injured! You’re not allowed to make fun of me!”

“Bull _shit_ ,” Iwaizumi laughs. “I can’t beat you up while you’re injured, so I’ve gotta make up for it by teasing you verbally. It’s only fair.”

Oikawa frowns, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Sit tight, I’m gonna go change then we can head home.”

“Who says I’m waiting for you?” Oikawa pouts.

“Even if you left now, I’d still catch up to you before you made it to the bus stop.”

“Not true!”

“I’ll buy you milkbread if you wait for me.”

“… Deal.”

“You’re too soft, Iwaizumi!” Kaga calls, and he laughs.

“After his rehab, Oikawa’s buying me dinner for a year. It’ll all even out,” Iwaizumi tells him as they head into the locker room.

When his team has left, it’s just him, coach, and the manager Suzuhara.

Only one more day of this, one more day until his surgery, Oikawa thinks.

“You nervous?” Coach asks as he clips his pencil to the clipboard he was writing notes on.

“Hmm?”

“About the surgery. Are you nervous?”

“A little,” Oikawa admits. “It’s kinda scary. I mean, being knocked out is kinda freaky. But honestly, it doesn’t feel real yet.”

“I had surgery when I was younger. Tore my ACL on a triple jump in track, senior year of high school. Physical therapy was awful. But of course, you already know that.”

 Oikawa grimaces. “Yeah.”

“Do what they tell you, Oikawa. There’s no magic spell that can make your body heal any faster than it wants to. Be patient, and you’ll come back just fine.”

Oikawa is about to thank Coach for his advice when he holds up his hand and continues. “Rush it, and I’ll kick you off this team so fast you won’t know what hit you.”

“Y-yes sir.”

When Iwaizumi comes out of the locker room, they head out toward the bus stop.

“Coach is really scary sometimes,” Oikawa whispers.

Iwaizumi just laughs.

“Only because you’re a baby.”

“Am not!”

“Are too. But it’s okay.”

Oikawa grunts a little with the effort of using his crutches. “It better be,” he mumbles.

 

*

 

The day of his surgery arrives much earlier than Oikawa wants it to.

Literally too early. His surgery isn’t scheduled until ten, but he has to be there at seven in the morning, so his alarm goes off at quarter to six.

Not that he needed it, since he’s been awake since around four.

Next to him, Iwaizumi stirs. He looks so gentle when he’s just waking up, Oikawa thinks, as he reaches out to slap at the alarm.

Oikawa had tried to go to sleep last night around eight thirty; he wasn’t supposed to take any medications or eat twelve hours before the surgery, so he popped his last pain killer with dinner and hoped for the best.

Around midnight, after over two hours of trying to will himself to sleep, Iwaizumi had knocked on his door.

“Oikawa?” he called softly. “You alright? I heard… noises.”

Oikawa had been trying his best not to cry, honestly. Between the physical pain, the mental strain, and the general anxiety over the concept of surgery, he was having a hard time keeping it together.

“I just want it to stop hurting,” Oikawa creaked.

“That’s what the surgery is for,” Iwaizumi said gently, stepping into the room and sitting on the edge of Oikawa’s bed.

“But what if it doesn’t work? Or it helps, but not enough? Or if it comes back again?”

“Right now, let’s try to think of the positive side. This surgery is going to clean up that tear so you can start _healing_ and you’re not literally _crippled_ by the pain. And then we’ll take each day as it comes, do your rehab, take care of yourself… You’re strong, Tooru. You’re gonna be alright.”

“But—“

“And if you’re not, we’ll figure it out.”

And then Iwaizumi had swung his legs up onto the bed, settled in around Oikawa, one arm thrown across his torso, and Oikawa had fallen into a light, restless sleep.

It lasted about two hours, then he woke up again. He fell asleep after about half an hour, and then woke once more at four.

At least now, he could get up and feel productive instead of lying in bed listlessly.

“I’m gonna go have a shower,” Iwaizumi says with a yawn. “I’ll set out some sweats and a t-shirt for you to get dressed, yeah?”

“I wish I could make you breakfast or something,” Oikawa mumbles as Iwaizumi untangles the sheets from his ankles and rolls out of bed.

“Nah, it’s fine. It’s really early for breakfast anyway; I was gonna grab something at the hospital while you’re in surgery.”

“Oh.”

“You work on getting dressed. I’ll be quick.”

Iwaizumi tosses a pair of navy blue sweatpants and a light teal Aoba Jousai practice tee at Oikawa and then slips out of the room.

Oikawa lets his mind zone out for a few moments until he hears the shower turn on in the bathroom.

With a sigh, he pulls off his faded Power Rangers pajama top, and yanks the fresh tee shirt over his head. He absently runs a hand through his hair before deciding he doesn’t actually care what his hair looks like for knee surgery.

Still sitting, he starts to pull the sweats onto his good leg first, and then his bad leg. As he’s gingerly trying to get his foot through the pants, though, he realizes he doesn’t have his brace on. It’s on the desk.

He’ll wait for Iwaizumi to grab it for him.

He can’t eat breakfast before the surgery, and he’s more or less stuck on his bed, so he grabs his phone and lies back down.

It’s too early for anyone to be up, but he’s got a couple of late-night texts from Hanamaki and Matsukawa wishing him luck on his surgery. He clears a few Facebook notifications, and briefly opens Snapchat before taking one look at himself in the front-facing mirror and deciding no filter or peace sign in the world could make him look cute enough for a selfie right now.

The shower turns off, and Oikawa reads a few news headlines while he waits for Iwaizumi.

“You made it halfway,” Iwaizumi says with a smirk, gesturing to the sweatpants around his ankles.

“Can you toss me my knee brace?” Oikawa asks, pointing to where it was flung on the desk last night.

“Ah, yeah, that’ll be helpful. You want your crutches, too?”

He walks to the bed and hands Oikawa the brace rather than toss it; Oikawa is grateful he doesn’t have to test out his hand-eye coordination when he’s this exhausted.

“I’ll get them when we leave.”

“Do you need anything else? Like, to take with you?”

“Photo ID, insurance card, and my medical history card that we made.”

“I stuck all that in your wallet last night,” Iwaizumi says.

“So… we’re ready?”

“Yeah, we’re ready.”

Oikawa sucks in a breath as he finishes adjusting his knee brace, pushes off the bed with his good leg, yanks his sweats up over his hips, and lets the breath out in a _whoosh._

“Let’s fucking do this,” he says in a voice that he normally uses for wiping the floor with his volleyball opponents.

“Hell yeah,” Iwaizumi says, and they fist-bump like they’ve executed a perfectly synched combo.

It’s not far off.

The ride to the hospital is quiet; most of the other people on the bus are commuters, sleepy and silent on their way to work.

It’s a bit crowded, so Iwaizumi stands protectively around Oikawa’s bad leg to keep other passengers from jostling him.

When they get to the main entrance, Oikawa can feel his heart rate pick up and his arms start to tremble on the crutches. Iwaizumi tells the receptionist who they are, and he makes sure Oikawa is registered and gives them directions to the surgical waiting room on the second floor.

The receptionist there asks them to sign in and wait for a nurse to come get them.

It feels like they wait forever, but a middle-aged nurse calls Oikawa’s name about twenty minutes later to get him ready.

She leads him to a curtained-off section with a bed, a chair, and a few monitors, and tells him to sit down on the bed.

The nurse gives him an ID bracelet, asks him if he has any allergies (no), if he had eaten in the past twelve hours (no), and the last time he took a pain killer (yesterday at 6pm). Then, she gives Oikawa a thin, stiff, hospital gown. It’s a ghastly shade of avocado green with little squares patterned all over.

Iwaizumi smirks at him when he makes a face.

“Just go put the damn thing on,” he says, stifling laughter.

The nurse leads him to the restroom, and opens the door for him.

“Take everything off, no jewelry, underwear, anything. And while you’re in there, pee in this cup, please,” she adds, handing him an alcohol swab and a plastic container.

Oikawa makes a face but takes the cup and closes the door, locking it carefully.

He takes off his clothes first, quickly putting the thin hospital gown on. It’s cold, and he hopes he gets a nice blanket back in his “room.” He discovers that the gown comes with socks with little rubber stoppers on both sides, and he puts those on, too.

He hasn’t had anything to drink, so he’s not sure how he’s meant to go to the bathroom, but eventually thinking about water gets the job done.

He grimaces as he puts the cap on, and taking a look at himself in the mirror, he decides it’s not worth trying to fix his hair and gathers his clothes to heads back to his bed.

When he returns to bed, the nurse hooks him up to an IV drip line.

“It’ll keep you hydrated, since you can’t drink, and then it’ll also be used to give you the anesthesia later,” she explains.

Oikawa nods, wincing at the pinch of the needle in the back of his left hand.

The nurse tapes it down to his skin so it doesn’t fall out or pull, and Oikawa draws in a sharp breath as she smooths the tape down, shifting the needle just slightly.

“Don’t mess with it,” Iwaizumi scolds with a raised brow as Oikawa wiggles his fingers and pokes at it.

The nurse purses her lips to suppress a smirk.

Oikawa whines, but pulls his right hand away from left.

The nurse leaves after confirming with him once again that it’s his right knee that will be operated on.

The anesthesiologist comes by after another half an hour or so, and tells them about the anesthesia.

“It’ll be injected intravenously,” he explains, gesturing to the needle in Oikawa’s hand, “and it’s just a standard general. It’s just like falling asleep.”

“So I don’t get to do the counting backwards from 10 thing?” Oikawa asks.

“You can if you want?” the doctor says good-naturedly. “Another nurse will be by soon to mark the knee.”

“Mark it?” Oikawa asks, but the doctor is already through the curtain and gone.

Fifteen minutes pass, and someone from registration comes in to confirm his information and insurance. Iwaizumi takes care of it, showing Oikawa’s insurance card once more to check it against what was entered in the computer system.

“They said someone would mark my knee,” Oikawa says, intending it as a question.

“Yes, a nurse will be in to do that soon,” the registration rep says, and soon he is gone through the curtain, too.

Iwaizumi tries to keep Oikawa distracted, talking about school projects, volleyball antics, news articles, cat videos… anything he can think of. Oikawa wonders absently if he has a list somewhere of conversation topics, because he never seems to run out of things to say.

Oikawa strongly suspects this chattiness is only half for his benefit; Iwaizumi seems anxious.

“Are _you_ nervous?” Oikawa asks, interrupting Iwaizumi’s anecdote about Kaga’s newest attack idea that would be so impossible to coordinate that the coach just laughed in his face.

“Huh?” Iwaizumi asks eloquently.

“You haven’t stopped talking for the past twenty minutes. That’s my job,” Oikawa says with a small smile.

“Oh, uh, I guess I just thought that you’d be nervous, so I was trying to keep your brain occupied?”

“And yours too, huh?”

“It’s perfectly normal to be concerned for my best friend,” Iwaizumi defends.

“I never said it wasn’t! I just asked if you were nervous!” Oikawa shoots back.

He won’t admit it, but the nerves are starting to build up in his chest. The waiting around has him restless; he just wants to get this over with.

“Of course I’m nervous! You’re _making_ me nervous!”

“Knock-knock,” a nurse says, peeking her head through the curtain. “Hope I’m not interrupting. Oikawa Tooru-san?”

“Yes,” Oikawa says, flipping his bangs out of his eyes dramatically, petulantly trying to act ‘more mature’ than Iwaizumi.

“I’m here to mark your knee,” she says, uncapping a marker.

“Is that why everyone keeps asking me which knee it is?” Oikawa asks.

“Yes,” the nurse says. “You’d be surprised how many times the wrong body part gets almost-operated on. So we literally mark on it to say ‘it’s this one!’ to the doctor and operating team.”

“My left leg is fine, so please don’t operate on it!” he tries to joke, but he settles his hand over it protectively anyway.

“We won’t,” she assures him. “So one more time: the right leg is the one to operate on, correct?”

“Yes. Right knee.”

She carefully draws an X on his knee with the marker. “Doctor Terushima will be in to sign it soon.”

“Sign my knee?” Oikawa asks.

“Yes, just to be extra sure,” she says with a warm smile.

“Thank you,” Iwaizumi says as she leaves the room with a hum.

“How often do they really operate on the wrong body part, you think?” Oikawa asks quietly.

“I have no idea but I will personally beat them up if they do that to you. Especially after all this double checking.”

“You’ve always got my back, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says with a genuine smile. “And between you and me, I don’t think Dr Terushima or that anesthesiologist guy would be tough to beat up. You could take them.”

“Hell yeah I could. I could take on the whole OR team if it came to that.”

“My hero-chan,” Oikawa says, batting his eyelashes dramatically.

“My idiot-kawa,” Iwaizumi says as he tries to bat his eyelashes back at Oikawa. He’s not very good at it, so it just looks like he has something in his eye.

“Mean, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa says through his laughter.

They lob insults and teases back and forth for a few minutes until Dr Terushima finally steps into Oikawa’s “room.”

“Good morning, gentlemen,” Dr Terushima greets.

Oikawa and Iwaizumi do their best to sober up, acting like giggling teenagers caught by the teacher.

“Glad to see you’re in good spirits,” he says warmly. “How are you feeling?”

“I’m ready to do this,” Oikawa says, brow set and jaw clenched.

“That’s what I like to hear. Now, I’m gonna sign your knee, then the next person to come in should be the anesthesiology nurse,” the doctor says as he checks his chart. “She’ll get you started on the drugs to help you relax, so you’ll start feeling groggy. Then it’ll be go time. About half an hour or so?”

Oikawa nods, watches as the doctor hastily writes the kanji for his name. It’s some of the worst handwriting Oikawa has ever seen.

“Alright. Right knee, torn meniscus, marked and ready for surgery. See you soon,” Dr Terushima says, and he swipes the curtain aside to exit the little room.

“Thank you, Doctor,” Oikawa says. He turns to Iwaizumi. “This is happening.”

“Yes, it’s really happening,” Iwaizumi confirms.

They lock eyes for a few moments, Oikawa seeking comfort and steadiness that he knows always exists within his best friend.

It’s not as fierce as he’s used to, but Iwaizumi’s gaze is warm and solid, with a depth that draws Oikawa in. It’s trust he sees in those deep brown eyes, and something Oikawa likes to call affection, though he’s certain Iwaizumi would deny it.

Maybe not in this moment, though, when Oikawa is about to do something as serious as having surgery.

Well shit. He’s having surgery.

“I’m scared,” he whispers to Iwaizumi.

“I know,” Iwaizumi says softly. “But you’re also strong and stubborn as all hell, so you’re gonna come out of this just fine, okay?”

Oikawa opens his mouth to counter Iwaizumi with a litany of “what ifs”, but Iwaizumi grabs his right hand in both of his own, squeezing it gently but firmly.

“I don’t want to hear your worst case scenarios and your ‘what if’ situations. Right now, we’re thinking about the good this will do for you, and that this is the first step on the road to recovery. It won’t be pretty, but I’ll be there with you, and we’re gonna kick your rehab’s ass, alright?”

“But Iwa-chan…”

“Alright?” he repeats, stronger this time.

“Alright,” Oikawa relents. He can feel those traitorous tears building, so he bites his lip hard to hold them back.

“I’m gonna text your mom,” Iwaizumi says after a moment. He lets go with one of his hands, but leaves the other clasped over Oikawa’s.

As Iwaizumi is holding his phone up trying to get the text to send through the terrible reception of the hospital, the anesthesiologist comes back through the curtain, a nurse right behind him with a small pink tray in her hands.

“You ready?” he asks.

“As I’ll ever be,” Oikawa replies honestly.

“That’s what we like to hear. We’re going to start the medicine that will make you relax, okay? When that starts to kick in, we’ll take you over to the operating room.”

Oikawa nods his understanding, and the nurse fiddles with the bag of saline solution that was filling his veins. She switches it out to a light pink bag, adjusts the pace of the drip, and writes it down on the chart.

“It’s nine forty-one,” the anesthesiologist supplies, looking at his watch.

“Thank you, doctor,” the nurse says.

“You’re going to start feeling groggy, like you’re about to fall asleep. Your body may start to feel heavy, like it’s hard to move your limbs. That’s exactly what we want to happen, so don’t panic. Let it relax you.”

Iwaizumi squeezes Oikawa’s hand.

“I’ll be back to check on you in a few minutes,” the doctor says. He and the nurse file out, leaving an eerie stillness in their wake.

“This is it,” Oikawa says. “This is the part that scares me the most, I think. Being drugged into sleep… It’s weird.”

“Yeah, but necessary. You wouldn’t want to be awake when they’re cutting your leg open, even if it is just little tiny incisions.”

“I know, but that doesn’t make this any less freaky.”

Iwaizumi texts Oikawa’s mom one more time to tell her Oikawa’s going to go in soon, and then he returns his attention to Oikawa completely.

Iwaizumi is holding his hand again, the one without the IV line in it. He starts rubbing his thumbs back and forth over the back of it, occasionally looking up to meet Oikawa’s eyes, but otherwise just staring at his hand.

Oikawa doesn’t notice it happening, but after about ten minutes he suddenly realizes that he feels very sleepy indeed.

The nurse from before comes in, and asks how he’s doing; his tongue is so thick he can barely reply.

“He’s ready,” she says, though to Oikawa’s ears it sounds like he might be underwater and she is above him, on a shore that keeps getting further and further away.

He feels Iwaizumi’s hands tighten around his own, feels it lifted (he tries to help but it’s heavy, so heavy), and something presses into it.

“I’ll be here when you’re all done, Tooru,” Iwaizumi tells him softly, a little muddled through the effect of the drugs that are settling in pretty hard.

The nurse is putting something on his head—a hairnet of the same material as his hospital gown—and he distantly mourns how bad his hair will look after this.

“Iwa-chan?” he slurs, hoping that the syllables are understood. _Am I drunk?_ He wonders.

Everything feels like a dream. There are two nurses now, one at the head of the bed and one at the foot, and there’s some clicking that Oikawa assumes are the breaks, the guard rails go up, and then he is moving.

They pass through a set of double doors and Oikawa feels just a bit more aware as he is hit with the intense chill of the operating room wing.

“It’s pretty cold back here, huh?” the male nurse at the foot of the bed asks. Oikawa thinks he’s talking to him.

“Yeah,” he mumbles.

“Don’t worry, you won’t notice it soon.”

They go through another set of double doors, and Oikawa’s vision is blurring but this looks like an operating room.

He sees a few people, but he can’t make out their faces.

Someone is introducing them all, and they hold out a hand to shake. Oikawa struggles to lift his hand to meet them.

Will he have to remember their names?

The two nurses are maneuvering his bed so he’s next to another bed—or is that a table? There’s a bright light shining on him, so he does what his body wants him to do and closes his eyes.

Someone is still talking to him, but it’s too garbled to understand.

He feels himself being moved, and something in his brain registers that he’s being transferred to the operating table.

He hears the people moving him getting ready, and then someone says “one, two…” like a count to pick up his weight, and then there is nothing at all.

 

*

 

“Welcome back,” is the first sound that Oikawa is able to decipher.

The voice is vaguely familiar, but it’s not who he wants to hear.

“Where’s Iwa-chan?” he asks. The words are still pretty slurred.

“You just woke up from the surgery. You’ll stay back here for a little longer and then you’ll see your friend,” the nurse says.

“No, no, Iwa-chan, where is… I need Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says, getting a little more panicked. He can’t quite shake the grogginess, the feeling of being underwater.

“Relax,” the nurse says in a smooth voice. “You’ll see him soon. He’s waiting for you in your room. I need you to take deep breaths, Oikawa-san.”

“I need to see him, I need him now, I need my Iwa-chan, Iwa-chan, _Iwa-chan_ ,” he begins chanting, voice growing louder as he tries to thrash around but his body is like lead and he can’t manage much more than some feeble wiggles.

 “Oikawa-san, I need you to stay calm. Deep breaths. We’ll get you to Iwaizumi-san in just a few minutes.”

Oikawa’s chanting drops back down to a whisper. “ _Iwa-chan_ ,” he breathes desperately.

“That’s it,” the nurse coos. “Nice and calm. You’ll see Iwaizumi-san very soon.”

The heaviness in his body overtakes him again, and he stills, feeling the tug of unconsciousness drag him away from the nurse and the weight of his body.

 

*

 

The next time Oikawa comes to, he is more alert and has absolutely no recollection of having woken up previously.

“Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says with a dopey smile. “You’re here.”

“Hey, Baby. I’m here.”

“Heh, you called me Baby,” Oikawa giggles. He feels drunk; loopy like some of the stronger pain meds made him feel.

“Shut up, loser. You were literally yelling at the nurses for me.”

“Wha?” Oikawa asks stupidly. “No I wasn’t.”

“Yeah, you definitely were. You should probably apologize when you see the nurse…”

“But I just woke up?”

“That _you_ know of. You were just starting to come out from the anesthesia, yelling about how you needed your Iwa-chan. The nurse spent five minutes calming you until you passed out again. She came and told me everything, asked me to wait here for you.”

“I know you love me, but you don’t have to make up stories about how much you missed me,” Oikawa says with most of his usual attitude.

“Tooru,” Iwaizumi says seriously, and the smirk falls from Oikawa’s face. “I’m being serious. You were literally yelling at the nurse for me. It’s ok; you were pretty drugged. I just think it was funny, is all.”

Oikawa pouts. “See if I ever ask you to help me again,” he says bitterly, but they both know he doesn’t mean it.

“How do you feel?” Iwaizumi asks, changing the subject.

“Heavy,” Oikawa says. It’s the only word that comes to mind, honestly.

When he takes a moment to really take stock of how he feels, he’s not sure what he was expecting, but it wasn’t… this.

His head feels foggy, but with each blink his thoughts come more into focus.

His body is lead, especially his bad leg which is so numb that the only reason he knows it’s still there is that he can see it.

And finally, Oikawa Tooru realizes something very interesting indeed.

He can’t feel any pain.

Now, this is probably at least thanks to all the drugs he’s on, but it’s such a bizarre sensation, to not feel constant, horrible, aching, sharp pain, that he marvels at it for a moment.

It’s like when you have a bad cold, and you forget what it ever felt like to breathe out of your nose, for your head not to feel like it’s full of cotton and snot. When you’re finally over the cold, it feels so liberating to breathe normally again.

Oikawa can’t feel the pain he has felt every day for far, far too long.

He can feel the relief paint across his features, and Iwaizumi cocks his head to the side.

“What is it?” he asks.

“I can’t… I don’t feel any pain.”

“Well, I should hope not. You shouldn’t feel anything right now.”

“I forgot what it felt like,” Oikawa marvels quietly. “To not _hurt_. I haven’t felt this in… months. I have literally been in pain for months with no breaks. It feels so… nice. God, _fuck_ , it feels so good to not be in pain.”

Iwaizumi squeezes his hand. “I’m so happy, Tooru. I’m so happy you’re not in pain.”

Iwaizumi tells Oikawa about the ridiculous daytime TV he watched in the waiting room, and Oikawa slowly texts his mom that he’s out of surgery and recovering.

His nurse from before comes in to check on his vitals, ask him some questions.

“I’m sorry for yelling at you,” he blushes deeply.

“Don’t worry about it,” she smiles. “It happens quite often, and you were pretty polite about it. No cussing.”

“Still… how embarrassing.”

The nurse just laughs. "We’ll start working on discharging you in about an hour or so. You’re coming out of the anesthesia well, but we like to keep you here until you’re more fully alert. You’ll be very tired the rest of the day, so please rest when you feel like it. But the grogginess and drugged feeling should be wearing off soon.”

They thank the nurse, and Iwaizumi pulls up a game of Sudoku on his phone.

They chat as they play, arguing over strategies to use and Oikawa texts with his mom as she asks him six million questions. He wasn’t paying that much attention when the doctors were talking, so Iwaizumi ends up fielding most of them.

“Ugh, she wants to come visit me to help with my recovery,” Oikawa gripes, tossing the phone on the bed instead of replying.

“You don’t want your mom to come take care of you?” Iwaizumi asks. “She’d cook and fetch things for you.”

“But that’s what I have Iwa-chan for,” Oikawa says, batting his eyelashes.

“Oi,” Iwaizumi growls. “I’m not your house-keeper.”

“No, but you’ll take care of me without the guilt trips and disappointed hovering,” Oikawa says, voice softening. “Tell her no for me.”

“No way, that’s all on you.”

“Iwa-chan,” he whines.

“No.”

“ _Hajime_.”

“Still no,” Iwaizumi says, crossing his arms over his chest. “Grow up. Text your mom.”

A few minutes later, as Oikawa struggles with how to word his text so his mom doesn’t get upset with him but he’s also not strictly lying, a nurse comes in.

“I’m here to go over discharge paperwork and follow-up," the nurse says. He’s got a stack of printouts in one hand, and a clipboard in the other.

“So, for the first two days, keep the incisions completely dry, keep the wrap on. Use the crutches to get around as needed. After two days, you can shower again, but keep the incisions as dry as you can. Keep it quick in the shower, and pat your leg dry as soon as you’re out of the water. Re-wrap it as soon as you’re able, for that extra support.

“Your skin will be discolored from the iodine; it’s normal and you probably won’t be able to wash it off. It’ll take about two weeks or so to come off.

“You’ll take a baby aspirin for two weeks, just in case, to prevent blood clots. It’s really rare that that happens, so it’s really just a precaution. Take the pain medication as needed, no more than three per day.

“Let’s see,” the nurse pauses. “What else…”

Oikawa reads over the discharge packet that details out what the nurse just said aloud. Thank goodness, because that was too much information for his still sluggish brain.

“You’ll need to follow up with Dr Terushima in a week. He’ll make sure that you’re ready for physical therapy, and then you’ll get started on that. He’ll also tell you when to get the stitches take out. Any questions?”

“Uh…” Oikawa says as he tries to absorb everything he’s just been told.

“I got it, Oikawa,” Iwaizumi says, waving a small notebook in his hand where he had honestly taken notes as the nurse spoke.

“And it’s all in that packet I gave you too, I’m just required to verbally discuss it with you, too. When you’re ready, sign that discharge form there—both of you, actually. The first line I highlighted is for the patient signature, second line is whoever is picking him up, saying that he’s not going to drive or go on his own back to his home.”

“Well, we’re roommates, so he’s stuck with me,” Iwaizumi says with a smirk.

“Like I said. Whenever you’re ready, sign it. I’ll be back in about five or ten minutes with his crutches and a wheelchair to bring him out front. Iwaizumi-san, if you want to pull your car around or call a cab, now’s a good time.”

Iwaizumi read over the form he was signing quickly, and signed his name. “I’m gonna go out to the front to call the cab company. Read that and sign it, ok? I’ll be back in like two minutes.”

Oikawa read over the form—acknowledging that he had been given discharge information and understood it. He signed it, his hand still feeling a little thick and not fully under his control, the kanji of his name coming out sloppy.

Iwaizumi comes back, a little out of breath like he had rushed back to Oikawa’s bedside. “Cab will be here in five minutes.”

The nurse comes in a moment later with a wheelchair and his crutches, and they’re helping Oikawa sit up, swing his legs over the edge of the bed, and help maneuver him into the chair.

His head still feels pretty foggy, and his right leg is still heavy and useless like it’s been filled with wet sand, but the nurse hooks Oikawa’s arm over his shoulder and guides him into the seat.

Iwaizumi takes the crutches and Oikawa’s bag as the nurse adjusts the foot pedals, delicately placing Oikawa’s leg on the metal plate so it wouldn’t drag as they rolled him out.

“You ready?” the nurse asks.

“Yeah,” Oikawa says, looking instinctively at Iwaizumi. His friend gives him a gentle squeeze on the shoulder, and they head out to the main entrance to wait for the taxi to pull up.

By the time the cab pulls up about four minutes later and he’s loaded into the front seat (more room for his legs there), Oikawa is all but asleep.

He vaguely registers Iwaizumi buckling his seatbelt for him, and the next thing he knows, they’re at their apartment.

 

*

 

That night, Iwaizumi insists on sleeping in the same bed as Oikawa.

“You can barely walk! What if you have to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night and you fall and bust your head open and die?” Iwaizumi asks.

“Are you serious?” Oikawa asks back incredulously. “That’s what the crutches are for. What are you going to do, _carry_ me to the toilet?”

“You won’t even reach for the TV remote from the couch, you lazy-ass,” Iwaizumi scoffs. “Don’t pretend like you’d be able to make it to the bathroom half asleep on your own.”

“Iwa-chan just wants to cuddle with me,” Oikawa says smugly.

“Yeah, right,” Iwaizumi says, but his voice sounds a little off.

“No need to be so _tsundere_ about it, Iwa-chan. We can snuggle whenever you want,” he says with a peace sign.

“Ugh, you’re the worst.”

“Am _not_ ,” Oikawa whines back.

“Whatever. I’ll take the window side, so if you need to get up, you won’t have to climb over me.”

“But if you have to, you’ll climb over me? Iwa-chan, how forward!”

“Shut up, asshole. Go to sleep.”

 

*

 

Oikawa doesn’t have to get up in the middle of the night so he and Iwaizumi are both blissfully alive and well in the morning.

“See, Iwa-chan? Nothing to worry about. No one got brained in the potty.”

“Why do you say ‘potty’ like you’re still a five year old?”

“I’m sorry, vocabulary police. Would you prefer the term ‘water-closet’?”

“Whatever. I’m gonna make breakfast, you want some?”

“Mm, thanks Iwa-chan!”

“You gotta get outta bed for it.”

“Aww, not gonna serve me on a tray? Get a little vase with a flower?”

“We own neither tray nor flower vase,” Iwaizumi deadpans.

“So you’d do it if we had those things?”

“Wh—no, Shittykawa!”

“Hmm,” Oikawa purrs. He adds buying a tray and flower vase to his to-do list.

Iwaizumi heads off to his morning lab, and Oikawa more or less resigns himself to sleep and bad TV. Coach gave him until next week to report back to practice, resuming his duties as stats cruncher and strategy booster. He’s not about to push it; he doesn’t think he has the energy to make it across the apartment to the bathroom right now, much less across campus to the gym.

Next week.

Bokuto stops by that afternoon with some slightly dubious notes from the lecture they share together. There are a lot of volleyball doodles in the margins.

“I get bored sometimes, ok?” he whines. “I really did my best, though! These are way better than what I usually take because I was gonna give them to you!”

“Thanks for the effort, Kou-chan,” Oikawa says with sticky insincerity.

Iwaizumi glares at him.

“Thanks,” Oikawa tries again, less facetious.

Iwaizumi gives a very slight nod of his head. _Better_ , his narrowed eyes say.

“So how’s it feel?” Bokuto asks.

“I can hardly feel my leg at all, but I’m exhausted. Sorry, I think I need another nap.”

“Oh, okay!” Bokuto says. “Well, Coach said you’d be back to practices on Monday! Well, not practicing yet, obviously, but sitting in at them. We all missed you these past couple days! Hope you get lots of good rest and stuff this weekend.

“And let me know if you can’t make it to lecture or whatever and I’ll take notes for you again! Or I can get Kuroo to do it, but you’ve seen his handwriting…”

“Thanks, Kou-chan. I’ll see you Monday,” Oikawa says, and begins the process of dragging himself back to bed.

He’s really glad he had so much practice on the crutches before the surgery, because if this was the first time he was using those infernal metal sticks, he’d probably have fallen on his face.

His balance feels wrong from his leg being so dead, and his progress is pretty slow to his bedroom, but when he gets there, he sits down carefully, picks up his leg and maneuvers it onto the bed, and he might be asleep before his head even hits the pillow.

 

*

 

The next time Oikawa wakes up, he feels a lot less exhausted. He’s not sure how long he napped for, but it’s quiet in the apartment outside his room.

He checks his phone and sees that it’s late afternoon; Iwaizumi is probably at practice. He sends him a quick text, passing on a hello to the rest of the team, attaching a sleepy-faced selfie with a peace sign.

He desperately needs to go to the bathroom, so he sets to standing up, and notices he has a bit more feeling in his leg than he did before. There’s still no pain, though, just a bit of discomfort, and a whole lot of weakness.

He goes to the bathroom first, and then decides to try to test out how much weight his leg can take. Using his crutches and with the soft safety of the couch behind him, he tries redistributing his weight over to his right leg, very slowly at first, scared of hurting himself.

He just wants to test it out, but he finds that he’s being so careful that he’s not really finding how strong it is.

It’s only been a day; he can’t be impatient _already_ , or he’ll never make it through physical therapy and the weeks of recovery he has ahead of him.

He goes to the kitchen to get some juice to drink, but is then faced with the challenge of needing both hands for crutches and somehow a hand for the juice itself.

He’s able to squeeze the crutches under his arms to open the fridge, but then he realizes he’ll never make it anywhere with a glass of juice if he has to clench his crutches in his armpits _and_ hobble around.

He sighs and returns the juice back to the fridge, looking around for his water bottle. That, at least, he can carry between his teeth by the spigot.

Returning to his now indented side of the couch, he slouches down and turns on the TV, finding some conspiracy theory documentary.

It’s not about aliens, but it’s better than staring blankly for the next hour before Iwaizumi comes home.

He’s really hungry.

He texts Iwaizumi, asking him to bring home food, and spaces out while some historian goes on about the elaborate hoax of the American moon landing.

When Iwaizumi comes home with fresh boxes of takeout in a white plastic bag, Oikawa beams. “My hero!”

“Yeah, yeah. You owe me 800 yen, by the way.”

“Wallet’s on the table,” Oikawa says, opening the box Iwaizumi has placed in front of him. “Mmm.”

“The team says hey,” Iwaizumi says, settling on the couch next to Oikawa. As he opens his own food, he glances up at the TV screen. “Um, what the hell are you watching?”

“American government conspiracy theories.”

“Wow. You’re a huge loser, you know that?”

“Shut up, it’s kinda funny.”

They eat quietly, and after Iwaizumi takes a shower, they work on some homework. It’s Friday night, but they had both missed class yesterday.

When Oikawa starts to nod off over his books, Iwaizumi nudges his shoulder and guides him into bed.

An hour later, Oikawa wakes up to the dip of the bed as Iwaizumi settles in next to him. He pretends it doesn’t wake him up, because he’s not sure what to say.

“G’night, Tooru,” Iwaizumi whispers.

 

Saturday is _boring_. After two days, he can hobble around their apartment with only one crutch, which is great because now he can carry things for himself around the apartment. When Iwaizumi is out for practice that afternoon, he finally gets his juice while he watches reruns of Naruto.

He really _should_ try to catch up and keep up with school work, but everything seems to take more energy than before, and his attention span is lower than usual, so he doesn’t make it far.

Despite all his protests that he’s _not_ Oikawa’s caretaker and that Oikawa can start doing shit for himself again, Iwaizumi is the perfect nurse, always getting Oikawa what he needs, making sure he takes his aspirin, bringing him an ice pack, offering to grab things that are across the room.

He indulges Oikawa’s laziness and “weakened, delicate state” all day, giving him only the occasional insult or dagger-like glare when Oikawa asks for something excessive like ice cream or a shoulder massage.

On Sunday, Iwaizumi puts his foot down.

“It’s been two days, you know. You can start trying to use your leg a little bit more. Flex it, walk around the apartment with your crutches, whatever you want. But don’t just sit there doing nothing; it’ll never heal that way.”

Oikawa pouts.

“Besides, isn’t it about time you shower? You reek and your hair looks like you put butter in it.”

“Mean, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa says, rising to the taunt.

Iwaizumi just smirks. “Get your ass off the couch.”

With an exaggerated moan of effort, Oikawa drags himself into a sitting position, then pushes himself up with the aid of his crutches.

Before he can shower, he has to remove the ace-wrap they put on him at the hospital, swaddling his leg from ankle to mid-thigh.

That’s not the hard part, though; when he removes it, he finds the source of the fuzzy feeling he’s had: thick rolls of cotton gauze are beneath the ace-wrap.

When he tries to pull it off, it sticks to him in chunks, caught in the horrible yellow gluiness of the iodine.

“Iwa-chan,” he whines.

Iwaizumi pokes his head into Oikawa’s bedroom and promptly laughs.

“Your leg has a beard,” he teases.

“Will you help me? This is gonna be so gross if I have to shower with this all over me.”

They spend about fifteen minutes trying to peel the white cottony fuzz from his skin before Oikawa gets frustrated and yells that it’s good enough.

“We’re gonna have to put it back on after I shower, anyway,” he complains. “It’s just gonna get all fuzzy again.”

“Probably,” Iwaizumi agrees.

Oikawa is glad he can’t see the stitches; they’ve been covered up with medical tape. Rubbing at the marker from where the doctor had signed his knee, he decides he’s ready.

“Iwa-chan, will you carry my clothes into the bathroom for me?”

“Sure.”

Showering itself is, to be frank, a huge pain in the ass. It’s nearly impossible to keep his balance, keep his leg away from the direct spray of the water, _and_ actually wash himself.

It’s probably the fastest shower Oikawa has ever taken, skipping most of his routine in favor of not slipping and falling on his ass.

He gets out, wraps his hips in a towel and sits down on the toilet seat to pull on his underwear.

Dabbing gingerly at his stitches, he tries to dry off his leg, then wraps it back up as best he can. (He probably should have asked Iwaizumi for help.)

He pulls on the fresh sweatpants, and tosses his t-shirt on before trying to gather up his dirty clothes in one hand so he can use at least the one crutch to get back to his room.

He’s putting his clothes in the hamper when Iwaizumi knocks on the door.

“Here’s your other crutch,” he says. “Though it looks like you’re getting around pretty well with just the one.”

“Yeah, it’s doing pretty well, actually. Not for long periods of time, but it doesn’t hurt, just feels _tired_.”

“I’m so glad you’re not in all that pain, anymore,” Iwaizumi says gently. He won’t make eye contact, which confuses Oikawa. Iwaizumi’s always been blunt and direct, and while his words still are, his actions don’t seem to fit.

They’re not _Iwa-chan._

“You okay?” Oikawa asks.

“Me? Yeah, I’m fine. I’m just… glad you’re recovering.”

“Was Iwa-chan worried?” Oikawa teases, trying to lighten the mood.

“Don’t ask stupid questions, asshole.”

 

That night, Iwaizumi sneaks into Oikawa’s bed again.

 

*

 

Oikawa joins the team at practice on Monday afternoon. He’s met with a round of applause as he clunks into the gym on both crutches.

“Went well, I take it?” Coach asks.

“Yeah. Should be all clear. Follow-up appointment is this Wednesday morning. Dr Terushima will decide if I’m ready for PT.”

“Good. And you’re following all the discharge directions?”

“Yes, Coach.”

“Not being too annoying to Iwaizumi?”

“I don’t think so. He hasn’t even been complaining as much as usual.”

“Good. Keep it up, Oikawa. We’ll see you back on the court before you know it.”

“I certainly hope so.”

“Treat PT like your training regimen. Use that diligence and dedication for your physical therapy just like you would for serve drills or setting techniques.”

“Yes, Coach.”

Throughout practice, his teammates come up and ask him questions about the surgery or his recovery. He feels like a broken record, telling them all the same story, but he’s not flirting with his fan club, so he doesn’t feel the need to embellish and make it exciting.

He didn’t like being at practice before his surgery, but now that he’s “recovering,” it stings a little more to be sitting on the bench. It’s only been four days, and he can barely walk without at least one crutch, but he wants to be _out there_ , feeling the rush of adrenaline, the drip of sweat, the sting of the ball, the jolt of electricity when he and Iwaizumi execute a perfect combo.

He feels out of sync, and it sucks to be stuck sitting here on this shitty, uncomfortable bench.

“Hey Coach?” he asks while his teammates set up for a new drill.

“What’s up?”

“Can you bring me something to prop my leg on? It’s getting kind of swollen sitting here.”

“You just want that chair, don’t you?”

“I’ll prop my foot on the chair if it means that much to you. But I really should have my leg elevated.”

“I’m just giving you crap, Oikawa. Suzuhara! Grab the metal folding chair in my office, would you?”

Iwaizumi watches Suzuhara and Oikawa as they arrange the chair behind the bench so he can prop his knee.

“Will you help me kind of… lift my leg? It’s really weak,” Oikawa asks.

“He can do it himself,” Iwaizumi calls. “Suzuhara! He can lift his own leg. He does it all the time at home.”

“Aww, Iwa-chan!”

“Don’t be a baby,” Iwaizumi scolds. “I told you; you need to start using your leg again. The doctor wants you doing quad-locks by your follow-up.”

“Whaaat?” Oikawa whines. He _hates_ quad-locks. He has to focus on the different muscle groups in his thigh: first, the smaller one on the inside, then the big one that runs along the top. Clench each of them one at a time, hold for five seconds, and release one at a time. They’re annoying and hard to control, and the smaller one is hard to flex without the larger.

“It’s in the discharge packet. I told you about it on Sunday. Now lift your own damn leg, and we’ll go over the rest of the discharge paper that you’ve conveniently forgotten when we get home tonight.”

“Kinky,” Kuroo stage whispers.

“That’s a lap, Kuroo!” Coach booms.

“Worth it!” he cackles obnoxiously.

 

*

 

Wednesday morning rolls around, and Oikawa is mostly walking without his crutches, though he takes one of them with him to classes and practice just in case. He can put most of his weight on his leg and walk with an almost normal gait.

He’s had some pain, but it’s mostly come from the tight pull of his stitches, soreness, and that one time he tried to sleep on his left side and his right leg slid over and made contact with the mattress. The pressure was _awful_ and he had yelped, waking Iwaizumi.

That’s another thing: Iwaizumi is still sleeping in his bed, even though Oikawa is more or less mobile at this point. He’s kind of gotten used to the closeness though, the warmth in his bed at night, and it becomes a silent agreement that Iwaizumi would just… be there.

Oikawa is fairly sure there’s something else going on with all this overprotectiveness, because in other areas Iwaizumi has no problem chewing Oikawa out for playing the “I just had knee surgery!” card. They need to talk about it, but Oikawa’s not ready to lose his bedfellow, so he waits. Maybe after his follow-up appointment, Iwaizumi will disappear from his bed, and the mystery will be solved.

Was last night the last time Iwaizumi would sneak into Oikawa’s bed? And why does that thought weigh so heavily on Oikawa’s chest?

Oikawa had assured Iwaizumi he could go to his follow-up alone; but Iwaizumi insisted, once again skipping a lecture to accompany Oikawa.

“Iwa-chan is going to fall behind in his classes,” Oikawa scolds on the bus to the orthopedist’s office.

“I’m fine. I’d worry about your own studies, asshole.”

“I’m a model student!” Oikawa hisses indignantly.

“Whatever you say, Shittykawa. Here’s our stop,” Iwaizumi says, standing with an arm outstretched for Oikawa to grip for balance.

He doesn’t really need it, but he finds himself reaching for it on instinct, so he follows through on the motion.

Dr Terushima is pleased with Oikawa’s progress, and wants him to begin physical therapy.

“The incisions are clean and healing nicely, and the fact that you’re walking so well after just a week tells me that this surgery has, so far, been successful,” he says with a firm nod. “To ensure your continued good healing, though, we need to start that PT. Get your muscles engaging and working again.”

“How often will I go? I was going two or three times a week before the surgery.”

“Three times is a bit excessive; we want to give your body time to recover from the surgery. Twice a week is fine. It’ll be at your physical therapist’s discretion when to take you down to once a week, and that of course will be influenced by your home program.”

“Oh he’ll have no problem with the home program,” Iwaizumi speaks up.

“Eh?” Oikawa balks.

“I’ll help you with the home program. Because I know you want to get back on the court as soon as possible.”

Dr Terushima shifts awkwardly. “I’m sure Oikawa-san is familiar with most of the exercises at this point.”

“That’s not the problem. I’ve known this guy since we were little kids. He needs supervision so he doesn’t overwork himself like an idiot. I’ll report to Coach and everything,” Iwaizumi assures.

Dr Terushima chuckles. “Sounds like you’ve got quite the keeper.”

“Iwa-chan isn’t my keeper,” Oikawa pouts at the same time Iwaizumi declares “I’m not his keeper!”

“Apologies, gentlemen. Anyway, Oikawa-san, please see my secretary to make an appointment to get your stitches removed. She’ll give you the PT referral, too. Same PT as before, right?”

“Yeah, he knows my history,” Oikawa agrees.

“Great. You’re all set, then,” Dr Terushima tells him.

They thank the doctor and head out, schedule an appointment for the stitches, and grab the next bus back to campus for their afternoon classes.

Oikawa is jittery, bouncing his good leg (always his good leg, he’s afraid to do _anything_ with his bad leg still) the entire bus ride. Iwaizumi sends him dirty glances but doesn’t say anything.

They split for classes, Oikawa walking slowly and carefully across the quad while Iwaizumi resumes his normal, quicker gait once they’ve said their “see you later”s.

Oikawa misses being able to stretch his long legs and keep up with his friends; he’s so tired of being left behind, dragging others down, dragging _Iwa-chan_ down.

He’s got to do this recovery right.

He’s going to kick physical therapy’s _ass_.

 

*

 

On Tuesday morning at eight AM, Oikawa has his first post-op PT appointment, and it’s _hard_.

It was awful before; all the sweating and straining and discomfort. It was a delicate balance between trying to strengthen the muscles and healing the joint, and all of it hurt.

Now, though, his leg feels _weak_ and useless: even the stuff he could do before surgery is impossible. It’s not just pain, but a physical inability to make his muscles do what he wants them to do.

Yamada insists it’s just the post-surgery process, and that he’ll start making a lot of progress in another week or so.

Oikawa would like to very politely call _bullshit_ , but Iwaizumi yelled at him already for whining about his physical therapist, so he keeps it to himself.

“Yamada-sensei is there to help you, and he knows what he’s talking about,” Iwaizumi had said. “Now shut up and stretch your gastrocnemius.”

Physical therapy used to start with a warm up on the stationary bike; now it starts with manual therapy, kneading the muscles into action by hand because they’re not ready to do anything else on their own.

It’s tender, and Oikawa hisses and whines like a tea kettle every time Yamada’s fingers work into the soft tissue nearest his actual knee.

“Do your best to relax,” Yamada tells him. “The more you tense up, the harder it is to get those muscles going.”

“But it _hurts_ ,” Oikawa moans, throwing an arm over his eyes.

“Well, we’re almost done here, and then you’ll start with alternating quad-locks and ankle alphabets.”

Quad-locks are, in Oikawa’s humble opinion, the Devil. Iwaizumi had warned him, but he hadn’t listened, and now he was going to pay the price.

The first time he tries to do a quad-set, his muscles don’t respond at all.

Focusing again, he’s able to get the large muscle to jump a bit, but not the small one. Then he gets both at the same time, instead of the small one first like he’s supposed to, and he lets out a frustrated growl.

“Going that well?” Shimizu asks with a barely-there smile.

“It won’t _go,_ ” Oikawa laments, gesturing to his leg, still a bit yellow-colored from the iodine. He _really_ wishes it would just wash off. Isn’t your skin supposed to fall off and regenerate? What was this? Instead of only the hideousness of the scars, he also has to deal with discolored skin? _Rude_.

“Give it time,” Shimizu says simply before walking over to another patient with a chart in hand.

He finally gets one quad-set with good form, panting and heaving with the effort.

“This _sucks,_ ” he growls, gritting out a second quad-set.

An elderly patient next to him chuckles.

Oikawa tries to bite back the _tch_ that he feels building up; he wants to yell at this old woman who’s sitting pretty with her heat pack and electro-stim therapy. What would _she_ know about his struggles?

“I was a soccer player when I was younger, you know,” she says conversationally. “Tore my MCL clean through when my cleat got stuck in the grass on a slide tackle. Surgery’s a bitch, but you’ve got youth on your side.”  

“Thanks,” Oikawa says after he manages his third quad-lock.

He’s about to break a sweat and he’s only done three muscle flexes.

He decides three is enough for the moment, and sets to some ankle alphabets. He props his leg up so his ankle can hang freely, and begins drawing kana with his big toe in the air.

He’s about four kana from the end when the woman next to him speaks again. “It’ll make you feel better if you do some of the exercises with your good leg, too. Just to feel like you’re accomplishing something.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” Oikawa says. He kind of thinks she may have a point, but all of this is just so _frustrating_ because he should be strong and capable; he is a nationally ranked college volleyball player for crying out loud! He should be able to do a few measly quad-locks.

But he’s a nationally ranked college volleyball player who overworked himself and nearly ripped his meniscus in half.

Maybe a few measly quad-locks are all he’s capable of anymore.

He finishes his therapy session in silence, letting the frustration and doubt and pain eat away at his thoughts.

Yamada tells him he’s done well today, and gives him a packet of stretches to try at home.

Oikawa stuffs it in his bag and wobbles home, one crutch under his arm and angry tears stinging at his eyes.

When he gets home, Iwaizumi is on the couch flipping through a textbook in a superficial attempt at studying. He takes one look at Oikawa, closes his book, and holds out his arms.

“That bad?” he asks as Oikawa gingerly walks towards the couch.

“My leg is more useless than before,” Oikawa sniffles, wiggling his way against Iwaizumi on the couch.  “It doesn’t hurt so much, but I can’t _do_ anything. What’s the point?”

“Oikawa, it’s been like, a week. Give it time. You’re progressing how you should; Dr Terushima said so. Just do what the doctors and Yamada tell you, and you’ll be back at it before you know it.”

They don’t talk about it anymore, just snuggle in closer, Iwaizumi’s arm around Oikawa’s shoulders, Oikawa’s leg propped up on the coffee table, cheek on Iwaizumi’s chest.

Iwaizumi opens up his laptop, pulls up Netflix, and turns on some inane cop drama they can lose themselves in for an hour or two.

 

*

 

After three days, Oikawa decides that the home program is worse than regular physical therapy.

First, because he knows that the home program is going to be the largest deciding factor in his recovery, or at least in the _speed_ of his recovery.

Second, because Yamada isn’t there to warm up the muscles with that horrible but effective kneading thing he does.

And third, because Iwaizumi Hajime is absolutely _ruthless_.

Iwaizumi had suggested Oikawa do his home program stuff at volleyball practice, to feel like he was working out with the team, and show Coach that he’s doing what he’s supposed to.

The problem with that, of course, is that Oikawa feels so _humiliated_ by his body’s weakness that he either skips the home program stuff completely (lying to Iwaizumi that he did it in his room), or he only does the easiest parts at practice (read: no quad-locks).

At morning practice before Oikawa’s second official PT session, Iwaizumi calls him on it.

 “Oikawa, I haven’t seen you do a single quad-lock this entire time. Get to it!”

 _Damn you for reading the home program packet_ , Oikawa curses mentally.

“Of course I’m doing them! You just can’t see from far away! It’s not like it’s a big showy motion. It’s subtle and refined, like most things I do.”

“First of all, you’re a clumsy idiot. Second, I know when you’re doing quad-locks because you make that horrible constipated face.”

“Mean, Iwa-chan!”

“Do your quad-locks, and I won’t have to make fun of your ugly mug.”

Oikawa makes a show of doing quad-locks with a big grin and his signature peace sign, but the grin is more of a grimace and the peace sign wavers at every flex of his muscles.

Normally, Oikawa thinks Iwaizumi would laugh, but instead he just nods solemnly, acknowledging that Oikawa’s doing what he’s supposed to.

 

*

 

After Oikawa gets his stitches taken out, he frets almost non-stop that they shouldn’t have been removed, that his skin is going to split open and he’s going to die of either blood loss or a MRSA infection or both.

Iwaizumi rolls his eyes but doesn’t say anything.

With the stitches gone, though, Oikawa is once again incredibly reluctant to do his home program. He’s afraid of pulling the skin, he’s afraid of getting something in the incisions, he’s _afraid_.

On Saturday morning, Iwaizumi digs out a box of outer space-themed band-aids and puts one on each of the incisions on Oikawa’s knee. Oikawa gives a shy smile at the gentleness of his friend’s gesture Oikawa is certain that in the past, Iwaizumi would’ve tossed the box at his head and told him to stop being such a wimp.

Breaking him out of his train of thought, Iwaizumi offers to do Oikawa’s exercises with him.

“Come on, you can be captain all over again,” Iwaizumi coaxes. “You always said flying falls were better when you knew everyone else was suffering along with you. Let me join you.”

“Iwa-chan’s a masochist!”

“Shut up. What’s the first exercise?” he asks, settling down on the floor next to Oikawa.

“Stretching first, Iwa-chan.”

“I’ll follow your lead,” Iwaizumi says.

Oikawa leads them through a variety of quad and hamstring stretches, hip abductor and adductor stretches, and two calf stretches.

“This one’s the gastroc stretch that we did a lot in volleyball,” he says, putting the exercise band around the ball of his foot and pulling it towards him. “And then, if you bend your knee… It stretches the sartorius!”

Iwaizumi draws in a quick breath as the pull changes in his muscles, and Oikawa smirks knowingly.

“I like that one,” Iwaizumi says. “We should introduce it to the team.”

“There’s a standing one that’s easier,” Oikawa says. “Well, easier if you can put your full weight on your legs. I’ll show you some time when I’m feeling up to it.”

“Yeah, that’d be cool. Maybe I could come with you to PT some time to watch the other stretches?”

“Sure,” Oikawa agrees, lying down on his back. “Okay, let’s get leg lifts out of the way, because they take a lot of strength. Then quad-locks, ankle alphabets, another round of stretching, and single leg standing.”

“Sounds like a plan, Captain,” Iwaizumi says, laying down next to him.

“Don’t be an asshole,” Oikawa snaps.

“What? I wasn’t being an asshole! You’re being an asshole!”

“Very mature, Iwa-chan. Ugh! You’re such a child.”

“Do your leg lifts.”

“Thought you were doing them with me,” Oikawa huffs, crossing his arms over his chest.

“Yeah, yeah, I’m ready. Start us off, come on. I have a paper to finish writing.”

“Then go finish your paper! I didn’t ask you to be here!”

“I _want_ to be here, okay? I just don’t have all day. Now are we going to do the damn exercise or not?”

“Fine!” Oikawa yells, and lays his arms flat at his sides.  Furrowing his brow, Oikawa bends his left knee, planting his foot firmly on the floor. Then, slowly, he lifts his right leg up, keeping his knee straight.

He only manages to get it about five centimeters off the ground, but Yamada told him it was more about the muscle engagement than the height for now, so he tries to ignore how pathetic he feels.

He brings his leg back down to the ground, taking a deep breath, and says, “One.”

“How many we doing?” Iwaizumi asks.

“Goal is ten this week.”

“Alright, only nine more then.”

“Yes, thank you Iwa-chan, I can actually count.”

“Trying to be supportive here, Assikawa.”

“You’re terrible at it,” Oikawa tells him, but they both know it’s a lie. Iwaizumi’s been the pinnacle of caring through all of Oikawa’s recovery.

After five leg lifts, Oikawa wants a breather.

“Halfway, come on!” Iwaizumi tells him. It’s his “encourage our kouhai” vice-captain voice. He sounds steady and strong, a pillar of support.

After seven leg lifts, Oikawa wants to swear.

“Fuck!” he exclaims, hoping that it will give him the strength he needs to lift his stupidly heavy leg.

“Grit it out, push through it!” Iwaizumi urges.

After eight leg lifts, he wants to die.

“I can’t,” he moans. The breaks between lifts has been getting longer and longer, and he can feel his leg giving out.

“Come on, Baby, only two more, you can do this!”

Oikawa freezes.

“Did you just call me ‘Baby’?” Oikawa asks, forgetting his agony for a moment in favor of letting out the hysterical, bubbling laughter that’s spilling up out of his throat.

Iwaizumi’s neck flushes bright red, chasing all the way from his ears to his forehead. “N-no, I called you _a_ baby because you can’t even do ten leg lifts!”

“Iwa-chan called me _Baby_ ,” Oikawa sings, clenching his abs once more to lift his leg up from the carpet.

He feels light and a little goofy, maybe at the prospect of Iwaizumi calling him a silly pet name, maybe at the weird little flutter he got in his stomach.

“I did _not_ , now shut up and give me dorsiflexion!”

 

*

 

The next day, Oikawa whines and complains like before.

“He can’t be serious,” Oikawa wails. “He can’t seriously think I’m ready to do this many exercises every single day. My leg is gonna fall off. My knee is disintegrating, I have no muscles, I’m going to _die_.”

“You’re so fucking melodramatic,” Iwaizumi snaps. “This is a college athlete? _This_ is the former captain of Seijou?” He’s goading Oikawa, trying to provoke him, and damn him, it’s working.

Oikawa sucks in a deep breath and grits his teeth. He blows out the air in his lungs hard as he lifts his leg up, holds it for three seconds, then tries not to let it flop to the floor.

“Nice job, Tooru,” Iwaizumi says. “Take a breather, then we’ll do a set of ankle alphabets.”

Oikawa is panting on the floor, but he doesn’t miss Iwaizumi using his given name. He’s glad he’s already working so hard, because the faint blush he can feel in his cheeks is probably not noticeable.

Iwaizumi is very stingy with using Oikawa’s given name, only breaking it out when he is completely serious and almost always alone. Even speaking with Oikawa’s parents, he won’t use it, referring to him instead as “your son.”

Oikawa closes his eyes and tries to memorize the way Iwaizumi says his name.

 

*

 

The next morning at about six fifteen, Oikawa wakes up feeling unusually refreshed. Iwaizumi is sound asleep next to him, comfortably on the other side of the bed but within reach.

Oikawa likes having him so close.

He shimmies over a little bit, and then slowly, so very slowly, extends his arm, reaching towards Iwaizumi. His face really is quite peaceful in sleep, and Oikawa has never been shy to admit that his friend is quite handsome.

His hand reaches out toward Iwaizumi’s face now, breathing even and quiet like he’s trying to catch a bug in the summer breeze rather than touch his best friend.

What would it be like to cup Iwaizumi’s cheek in his hand? To smooth the crease between his eyebrows with the pad of his thumb?

_Almost there, so close…_

Oikawa’s index finger and thumb clamp down on Iwaizumi’s nostrils, and he jerks out of his peaceful slumber in alarm.

His arms and legs flail, fighting off his attacker, and Oikawa loses himself to giggles.

“Wake up, Iwa-chan!” he chirps.

“You asshole!” Iwaizumi yells. “What the fuck is wrong with you?”

“I’m hungry. Will you make breakfast?”

“For an ingrate like you? Pass.”

“Iwa-chan!”

“Why can’t you just poke my shoulder like a normal person? What if I had kicked your knee when I woke up? Would you be laughing then?”

Oikawa sobers up a little, defensively moving a hand over his knee cap. “No, but you would never hurt me, right?”

“Not intentionally, no, but I can’t make any promises when you _suffocate me to wake me up_. Use your fucking brain sometime, would you?”

“I’m sorry, Hajime.”

“Apology accepted. Now give me another half an hour of sleep, and I’ll make you a rice omelet.”

Oikawa ends up falling back asleep himself, so it’s Iwaizumi who wakes him at eight, telling him breakfast is ready.

“Thanks for breakfast, Hajime,” Oikawa says carefully, looking out from under his messy bangs to gauge Iwaizumi’s reaction.

He hums in response.

Oikawa smiles to himself, rubbing at his knee absently.

“Any plans for today?” he asks through a mouthful of food.

“Dude, you’re spitting rice everywhere. Didn’t you learn how to eat better than this?”

“Living with a brute like Iwa-chan must have dulled my table manners,” he says.

“This brute doesn’t have to cook for you, you know.”

“Iwa-chan is my favorite brute!” Oikawa chirps quickly.

“Uh-huh, I’m sure. Just another brute in the Oikawa harem. When will the Grand King notice me?” his voice drips with sarcasm.

“I always notice Iwa-chan,” Oikawa says seriously. “He’s my favorite harem girl.”

“Idiot,” Iwaizumi teases, and they leave it at that.

 

That afternoon, Oikawa is finishing his final set of quad sets when he realizes it’s been almost three weeks since his surgery.

He’s walking with almost no limp, and at close to a normal pace.

Leg raises and quad sets are still a pain in the ass, but they’re easier now, at least.

When he finishes the whole set without complaining, he smiles brightly at Iwaizumi, who is still doing the workouts with him. “Are you proud of me, Hajime?”

“I’m always proud of you, Tooru,” he replies without hesitation.

“Bwuh?” Oikawa splutters. “That was so serious, Iwa-chan!”

“So?” Iwaizumi asks, but he’s embarrassed: neck turned a dusty pink, eyes downcast, mouth twisted in a half frown. It’s _adorable_.

“I just… wasn’t expecting it!” Whenever Oikawa looks for praise, Iwaizumi likes to respond with banter or a joke; it’s just how they function, and it’s how Oikawa knows Iwaizumi is complimenting him sometimes.

“You called me Hajime. I thought that was your serious voice.”

“I…” Oikawa says. He _was_ being serious, but that wasn’t why he used Iwaizumi’s given name. He used it because…

Because… Why had he used it?

Because Oikawa _loves_ his best friend’s given name, not just because it’s attached to Iwaizumi.

Okay, it’s mostly because it’s attached to Iwaizumi.

But still, it’s a beautiful name: he likes how the syllables flow, and how gentle it can be.

It fits Iwaizumi pretty well, he thinks. 

Ever since Iwaizumi called him “Baby”, he’s been sneaking it into their everyday conversations here and there, where he thinks Iwaizumi won’t notice, or at least, won’t be in a place to complain.

“Dumbass,” Iwaizumi says affectionately when Oikawa’s silence has stretched on well beyond the awkward point. “You’re an idiot, but I’m proud of you. You had knee surgery and now you’re making fantastic progress back to being the star player you were always gonna be.”

“Iwa-chan!” Oikawa exclaims, face burning with the attention.

“Are we done being sappy now? You should really stretch out before your muscles get cold.”

 

*

 

Another week goes by, and Oikawa is starting to feel light and hopeful again. The insurmountable exercises are becoming a nice, low burn instead of sapping him of all his strength. Yamada has him doing three sets of everything at home instead of two, and it seems they’re adding new exercises every session.

He feels like he really is an athlete again, and not some weak, noodly excuse for a college volleyball player.

Iwaizumi comes to a session with Oikawa, so he can learn how to help stretch out Oikawa’s _alarmingly_ tight hamstrings.

Yamada shows him first, guiding Oikawa’s leg up and across his hips.

“He should be totally relaxed when you do this. The whole point of a second person is to let his muscles decompress and stretch out as much as possible. I’m holding all the weight of his leg right now.”

Yamada returns Oikawa’s leg to the table, and repeats the motion once more.

“Want to give it a shot?” Yamada asks.

“Sure,” Iwaizumi says, but his hands fidget.

He picks up Oikawa’s leg, and lets out a little sound of surprise when it’s so _heavy_.

“Get a good grip on him,” Yamada says. “You don’t want to drop his leg!” He’s going for levity, but Oikawa grimaces when Iwaizumi pales ever so slightly.

 _He’s probably imagining all the ways he might hurt me if he drops me_ , Oikawa thinks. “Iwa-chan should be used to man-handling me by now! Always pushing and shoving at me. Lifting my leg should be no problem!”

“Wouldn’t have to push you around so much if you’d just do what you’re supposed to,” Iwaizumi grumbles, but he looks less tense.

When he’s got the hang of the motion to the satisfaction of Yamada, they move on to the next stretch.

“This one’s easiest on a table,” Yamada explains as he moves into position, “though you could probably do it on the floor, too. So, I’m going to put my knee up here on the table, and bring his leg up, resting his calf on my shoulder. You don’t want to be too far in, since his muscles are still so tight, but too far out and he won’t stretch enough.”

“Right at the calf, got it,” Iwaizumi says with a strict nod.

Then, Yamada leans forward, almost hovering over Oikawa.

 “After you hold a few seconds, pull back. Then he’ll push his leg down into your shoulder”—he taps Oikawa’s leg to prompt the motion—“and then when he relaxes, you push back in. It deepens the stretch.”

“Deeper stretch. Right,” Iwaizumi says, though he looks a bit flustered.

“Your turn,” Yamada instructs.

Iwaizumi still looks terrified to touch Oikawa, like he might break his knee off or something, but he moves towards Oikawa, and awkwardly hikes his leg up onto the table as Oikawa lifts his leg.

Iwaizumi mechanically guides Oikawa’s foot to his shoulder. Oikawa watches him swallow thickly.

They make it through the stretch, but Iwaizumi is making eye contact almost the entire time, and Oikawa is getting fidgety with the uncomfortable stare.

Iwaizumi places Oikawa’s leg back down on the table gently, and steps away, excusing himself to get a drink of water.

By the time Oikawa gets to ice down, he’s stretched for a good twenty minutes.

“That’s the loosest my hamstrings have been in _months_ ,” he sighs as Yamada sets up the electro-stim machine.

“Damn right it is,” Iwaizumi says, returning from his trip to the water fountain.

“All thanks to my Iwa-chan!” he chirps, and Iwaizumi slaps his chest lightly, turning his face away with what _must_ be a blush.

 

*

 

It’s only when Oikawa asks Iwaizumi to stretch him out at home, on Oikawa’s bed (that they’ve been sharing for the past three weeks), that Oikawa finally figures out why Iwaizumi seems to be, well, awkward about stretching when he’s been nothing but a drill-master with all other things recovery-related.

Oikawa decides that if he can pretend it’s not awkward, then it won’t be, so he pushes through the lingering weirdness from yesterday’s PT session to lay down on his bed.

Dutifully, Iwaizumi picks up Oikawa’s right leg, placing it gingerly on his shoulder, and with a deep breath, he leans forward. He pulls back, Oikawa pushes, and Iwaizumi leans forward again. Focused, professional, mechanical.

_There, nothing to be weird about._

That is, of course, until Oikawa sees Iwaizumi’s face when they come out of the stretch.

“Iwa-chan? What’s … what’s with that face? Didn’t I stretch it right?” he asks cautiously.

“You did fine,” Iwaizumi grunts.

“You forgot to insult me _and_ you’re blushing? What is this?”

“Why would I be blushing? Shut up! Assikawa!”

“Iwa-chan…” Oikawa pushes, a teasing lilt to his voice. He’s always loved pushing Iwaizumi’s buttons; he can’t stop now.

“Clamshells, let’s go.”

“Don’t change the subject!”

“Clamshells _,”_ Iwaizumi repeats more forcefully.

Oikawa huffs a breath and rolls his eyes, but he lets it drop for now. He slides off the bed to the floor and lies on his side with his back to Iwaizumi, bends his legs, and raises one knee so he looks like a clam.

“Physical therapy names are all so literal,” he notes.

“Yeah, so you remember what to do. Do you want them to be called weird things like ‘sakura tree’ or something?”

“It would certainly be more poetic,” Oikawa grumbles. “So undignified!”

“At least they’re pretty easy, right?”

“Yeah.”

After two sets, the ache in his muscles is too much. _So much for easy_. Even his hip flexors are out of shape from this damn knee injury; how much else has been affected by this? His ankles? His deltoids?

_Where does it end?_

“I can’t do the third set yet,” he whines, letting his right leg flop down onto his left, hissing slightly at the pull on his still-healing skin.

“Yes, you can. Do you want to play volleyball soon?”

“Of course!”

“Then do the third set!”

“It’s _hard_ ,” Oikawa complains.

“So you’ll play through a torn meniscus, but a little muscle conditioning is too much pain for you?”

“Grahh!”

“Yes, there it is!” Iwaizumi cheers. “Nine more, let’s go, Baby.”

He counts down as Oikawa does each clamshell, his cries getting more guttural, more animal like.

When he finishes the set, he lets his whole body go limp, arms spread out, chest heaving from exertion.

“You’re incredible, Tooru,” Iwaizumi says.

Oikawa sits up, wipes the sweat from his brow. “Only because of you. How pathetic would I be without my Iwa-chan?”

“You wouldn’t have made it past middle school without me,” Iwaizumi teases, bumping his shoulder against Oikawa’s.

“That’s probably true,” Oikawa says, turning serious.

“Hey, I was joking. You’re strong. You’d’ve been alright.”

“Maybe, but I wouldn’t be nearly as happy as I am with you,” a small but sincere smile paints his face.

Iwaizumi stares at him, mouth slightly agape, like he’s not sure how to proceed.

 _It’s okay,_ Oikawa thinks. _I’ve always been the talker in this relationship._  

“You called me Baby again.”

“I—yeah.”

“I think it’s sweet,” Oikawa says after a moment.

“It wasn’t on purpose.”

“That might be even sweeter.”

“Shut up.”

“Make me?” He means for it to come out like a taunt, but it’s more a quiet plea.

Iwaizumi hears it, and somehow knows exactly what he means, as always.

He leans forward slowly, his gaze flicking between Oikawa’s eyes and his mouth.

When they get close enough that he can’t focus his stare anymore, Oikawa closes his eyes and closes the distance.

Their lips meet in a somewhat clumsy, dry brush, but it feels like home.

When they pull back, they take a moment to just sort of stare at each other before erupting in giggles.

“Did we just ..?” Iwaizumi asks.

Oikawa for once, can’t find any words, so he just nods with a big, giddy smile on his face.

“Can we do it again?” Iwaizumi says, shyer still.

Oikawa responds by wrapping his arms around Iwaizumi’s neck, drawing him close.

The second time is just as clumsy, but sweeter, warmer, and a little slicker. (Iwaizumi licked his lips first.)

They break apart for an instant, just to hear the satisfying _pop_ as their lips pull away, before they dive back in.

Oikawa tilts his head a little more, trying to find a better angle for their noses. The kisses aren’t deep yet, but Oikawa wants it, wants to kiss Iwaizumi’s mouth open, have him panting and grabbing at Oikawa, pulling their bodies together. So he tries to lick at Iwaizumi’s lips, to get him to open his mouth. Iwaizumi chuckles, low and rumbling and deep in his chest, and Oikawa can feel it through his lips, where they’re connected.  

Oikawa tries again, his tongue running along the seam between Iwaizumi’s lips. But then Iwaizumi pulls away. Oikawa whimpers.

“Oh, hush,” Iwaizumi says, tilting Oikawa’s face down and kissing his forehead instead. “Propping myself up on the floor is killing my wrist. Let’s sit on the bed.”

“How forward, Iwa-chan!” Oikawa giggles, but holds his hands out for Iwaizumi to help him off the floor. It’s not that he _can’t_ get up on his own by now, but it’s much faster and more fun to let Iwaizumi—strong, wonderful Iwaizumi—pull him up instead. Besides, it’s not like he seems to mind.

Iwaizumi settles Oikawa on the bed first before he sits right next to him. He seems to have lost his nerve for a moment, so Oikawa leans forward first, catching Iwaizumi’s lips in a playful kiss.

Oikawa’s never known how to take things seriously, and Iwaizumi has a hard time taking anything as a joke. In this as in most things, they are complements of each other, rounding out their individual deficits with a smooth and easy partnership.

Iwaizumi presses in harder as Oikawa tries to pull back, putting his hand over Oikawa’s on the bed between them. Oikawa wants to taste the heat inside Iwaizumi’s mouth, wants to _connect_ to him.

This time, when he licks at Iwaizumi’s lips, they open just slightly. It’s not as much as he wants just yet, but it’s progress.

 _Is this his first kiss?_ Oikawa wonders as he feels Iwaizumi draw in a sharp breath. He starts to work his lips against Oikawa’s, growing more confident. Oikawa puts his hand on Iwaizumi’s jaw, feeling the muscles work as they move Iwaizumi’s lips across his own.

Not to be outdone, Iwaizumi cups Oikawa’s face between both of his hands, kissing him sweetly, tilting Oikawa’s head to the exact angle he wants.

Using the pad of his thumb, Oikawa rubs at Iwaizumi’s jaw, coaxing it open, relaxing him.

Finally, _finally,_ Iwaizumi parts his lips enough, and Oikawa drags his tongue along the inside of Iwaizumi’s lower lip, sucking at it, pulling it into his mouth.

Iwaizumi lets out a sigh so sweet and gentle that Oikawa feels his heartbeat catch at it.

As though they’re melting, they both lay back onto the bed, legs still hanging off the edge, still clutching each other’s faces, still moving lips against the others’.

As they settle against the duvet, they’re on their sides facing each other. Oikawa drops his hand from Iwaizumi’s face to rub it across those broad shoulders he’s always admired. Encouraged, Iwaizumi shifts his hips forward toward Oikawa, one knee pressing between Oikawa’s thighs and –

“ _Ow,_ ” Oikawa cries in pain.

Immediately, Iwaizumi flies away from him, sitting up.

“Oh shit, I’m so sorry, what did I do, what’s hurt?” he asks, panic written clear across his face.

“It’s fine, I’m okay. It just… shocked me. Your knee just sorta… rubbed against one of the scars.”

“Shit,” he curses at himself.

“It’s alright,” Oikawa says, sitting up and putting a comforting hand on Iwaizumi’s thigh. “We just need to change positions.”

Something in Iwaizumi’s expression clears, and he stands. “I have an idea,” he clarifies before Oikawa can complain about him leaving. “Swing your legs up onto the bed.”

Iwaizumi casts around the room for something, before he settles on a large striped pillow. He crams it behind Oikawa’s back against the headboard. 

“Lean back,” he instructs, and Oikawa can’t find a reason to say no.

That assertiveness only lasts for a moment, because as soon as he starts to move, Iwaizumi is blushing and biting his lip nervously.

 _He’s so cute,_ Oikawa thinks. But then he decides that’s not quite right; Iwaizumi is so much more than “cute.” He’s gorgeous and brave; handsome and loyal. 

While Oikawa is admiring his best friend, he seems to miss the part where Iwaizumi climbs up on the bed, and gently, so gently, straddles Oikawa’s thighs.

“Hajime,” Oikawa breathes, and then they’re kissing again, soft and so slow it feels like they’re not even moving.

Their lips linger on each other’s for a second, and Oikawa doesn’t want to breathe, for fear of ruining the delicate intimacy of this moment.

Iwaizumi pulls his head back to separate their mouths. “Tooru,” he says simply, and Oikawa’s hands fly up to his face to pull them back together again.

Iwaizumi is up higher than Oikawa now, sitting on his lap as he is, and so Oikawa has to tilt back more than before. Iwaizumi helps him by running his fingers through Oikawa’s curls, tugging gently to get the angle he wants.

Their next kiss is just as fragile as the previous one, and Oikawa thinks they might break. He can’t take it, he needs oxygen, so he slides his hands down Iwaizumi’s sides until they’re clutching his hips, and he kisses hard, lips firm and unyielding against Iwaizumi’s.

Mouths open, moving against each other, Oikawa darts his tongue into Iwaizumi’s mouth again, only to be met by Iwaizumi’s own. He sucks in a breath in surprise, but he’s happy with the development.

Fingers dig in deeper to Iwaizumi hips, strong hands tug at hair to drag his head to the side, and then those lips are mouthing along Oikawa’s jaw, down his neck. His shirt is in the way to go any further, so Iwaizumi tugs at the collar to get at more skin.

Oikawa lets out a frustrated noise and they break apart just long enough to get Oikawa’s shirt up and over his head before Iwaizumi is back to mouthing over all that burning hot skin.

Oikawa’s breath is coming in little pants now, little puffs of air that sound like _ha_ , but he can’t make his mouth say the next two syllables of his friend’s name.

He gasps when the wet, open-mouthed kisses on his shoulder turn to little nips. Iwaizumi is working his teeth into the skin now, sucking hard at the skin.

“Are you trying to give me a hickey?” Oikawa manages, panting like he just did wind-sprints.

Iwaizumi pulls away with a smack, looking straight into Oikawa’s eyes from under those long, dark lashes. “Do you not want me to?”

“I was just surprised, is all. I didn’t think you’d want to.”

“Oh,” he says, and suddenly that shyness is back.

“Hey, hey, it’s alright. I like it. It means we’re together.”

“We are?” He whispers back.

“We’re making out in my bed. I thought…”

Iwaizumi suddenly looks uncomfortable on his lap, so close, and he moves back.

“Stop!” Oikawa cries out, right as Iwaizumi is about to sit on Oikawa’s knees.

“Gah!” he shouts, realizing what he was about to do. Instead, he dives to the side, face-planting into the bed and untangling his legs from Oikawa’s.

He lets out a groan.

Oikawa just takes a peek at his shoulder—a light mark is showing, but nothing excessive and it can be covered by a shirt no problem—and then he shimmies down to lie flat on the bed.

He rolls onto his side, gently so he can get his knee in a nice place, and then he rests an arm on Iwaizumi’s back, stroking it gently. 

“M’sorry,” Iwaizumi mumbles into the bedsheets, “bout your knee.”

“Mmm, don’t be,” Oikawa hums. “It’ll happen. I forgot about it at practice yesterday, tried to put my elbows up on my knees in the huddle. Stung like a bitch.”

“I just…” Iwaizumi flounders, lifting his chin away from the blankets. “I want … fuck, I don’t know. Are we together?”

“I want to be.”

“Really?”

“Yes, really.”

“Oh.”

“Do you want to just cuddle for a little bit?” Oikawa asks in the awkward silence that has descended over them.

“Yeah,” Iwaizumi laughs.

“Well then, Iwaizumi Hajime, prepare to be spooned.”

 

*

 

One month post-surgery, Oikawa’s home program expands with each new session: more repetitions, more sets, more exercises. As his strength returns and their newly physical relationship develops, Iwaizumi shifts tactics in his role of “at-home trainer.”

“If you can do all four sets of sailboats, we can make out for ten minutes afterwards,” he suggests.

“Only ten minutes? No deal. I want half an hour,” Oikawa barters.

Sailboats are his newest bane: he ties a resistance band to a table leg and then to his left ankle. Standing on his right leg, he must lift his leg up to create a triangle between his extended leg, his plant leg, and the table. 

The angle of the band is supposed to look like a sailboat, he supposes, though all it ever looks like is suffering.

“Fifteen minutes,” Iwaizumi counters.

“Twenty,” Oikawa says immediately.

“Fifteen and I’ll take my shirt off.”

Oikawa pauses.

“Deal.”

He ties the green resistance band—tougher than the red, but not by much—around his ankle, and puts the loop on the other end around the chair. Iwaizumi sits in the chair so it doesn’t move.

“Which direction first?” Oikawa asks.

“You pick. Do the hardest one first maybe? You’ll have more energy for it.”

Oikawa starts with going backwards first. Left hand on his hip, right hand steadying himself on Iwaizumi’s shoulder, he lifts his right leg straight back in a quick, fluid motion, and then brings it back down slowly to the neutral position.

When his set of ten is complete, he rotates, swinging his leg out to the side next, and then he swings it forward.

“Keep your upper body straight, don’t bend over,” Iwaizumi coaches him. “Good!” he exclaims when Oikawa makes the correction in the last six.

 “Take a quick breather,” Iwaizumi says, “and then we’ll do set two.”

Oikawa starts whining at the end of set three.

“Four sets is monstrous!” he wails. “Clearly, Yamada-sensei has never torn his meniscus and had surgery, because this is just _cruel_.”

“Stop being so dramatic,” Iwaizumi says, rolling his eyes. “The point is to build your strength back, not do what’s comfortable. Does it _hurt_ or are you just tired?”

“Just tired,” Oikawa admits begrudgingly.

“And you’re gonna let a little muscle fatigue stand in your way of fifteen minutes of _shirtless makeouts?_ ”

“Can’t we do like, ten minutes instead of the last set?”

“Nope. All or nothing. The deal was four sets, not crap out after three like a spoiled brat.”

“Mean, Iwa-chan,” Oikawa whines, but gets in position to start the fourth set.

Iwaizumi counts him down, and he grits his teeth.

One direction down, and he lets out another pitiful whine.

“Come on, Baby, push through. Think of volleyball,” Iwaizumi urges. Oikawa’s pout looks a bit angry.

“Think of… my abs?” he says instead, pulling up his shirt enough to reveal a thin strip of his dark, toned stomach.

Oikawa’s laugh is an awkward, explosive giggle. “Don’t distract me!” he cries.

“Well finish your set, then!”

When he finally returns to neutral after the last sailboat, he practically rips the resistance band from his ankle and launches himself at Iwaizumi, who catches him with practiced ease.

“You’re such an idiot,” he mumbles affectionately into their kiss.

“But I’m _your_ idiot,” Oikawa smiles.

“Mmm,” Iwaizumi agrees. He fumbles with something in his pocket, and Oikawa sees that he’s taking out his phone.

“Ooh, are we taking selfies, Iwa-chan?”

“No, I’m setting a timer.”

“Gwaa?”

“I told you fifteen minutes. I have a paper to finish writing today.”

“Iwa-chaaaan,” Oikawa whines.

To shut him up, Iwaizumi leans back and pulls his shirt off, then picks up Oikawa, who gently wraps his legs around Iwaizumi’s waist. Iwaizumi walks them both into the bedroom, deposits Oikawa on the bed, and lies down carefully on top of him.

It’s been four weeks since the surgery, so he’s not worried about re-opening the incisions, but they’re still a bit tender to the touch, and Oikawa appreciates the delicacy.

When their legs are safely arranged, Oikawa relaxes into the bed, letting Iwaizumi nuzzle into his neck, peppering kisses along the tendon there.

He wraps his arms around Iwaizumi’s shoulders, rubbing the smooth, warm skin there.

“Hajime,” he breathes. “Let me take my shirt off too.”

Iwaizumi pulls his mouth away from Oikawa’s throat with a sweet noise, and sits up a bit. He runs his hands up Oikawa’s abdomen, taking the t-shirt with it. Oikawa stretches his arms up and arches his back like a cat, and Iwaizumi pulls the shirt up and over his head.

“Mmm, much better,” Oikawa coos.

“Eleven minutes,” Iwaizumi says, and lies back down on top of Oikawa.

Oikawa guides Iwaizumi’s face back down to his, and catches his lips in a deep, rough kiss. It feels kind of dirty, and Oikawa likes it.

He moans into the kiss, trying to rile up Iwaizumi.

It works.

Iwaizumi lifts himself up, throwing his head back with a moan of his own. “Dammit, Tooru,” he says, but there’s no malice in it. “I really do have homework to finish.”

“And you’ll still have time to finish it even if we take more than fifteen minutes,” Oikawa says in a low, sultry voice.

 “But…”

“Hajime,” Oikawa whispers, licking into Iwaizumi’s mouth slow and sweet.

Iwaizumi kisses back, opening his mouth and letting Oikawa’s tongue thrust deep.

“Fuck, what are you doing to me,” he moans when Oikawa pulls back to kiss his neck.

“I want to kiss you everywhere,” Oikawa whispers. “Your lips, your chest, your abs, your cock…”

The noise that rips from Iwaizumi’s throat sounds thick with arousal.

“T-Tooru…” Iwaizumi manages.

“I don’t know if I can get to it without hurting my knee right now, so I’ll save it for later.”

“You fucking tease,” Iwaizumi hisses.

Oikawa presses his hips up into Iwaizumi’s, grabbing at his ass with greedy, strong fingers. “Am I being a tease now?” he taunts.

“ _Yes,_ you asshole!”

“I’d say I’m _your_ asshole, but that doesn’t work as well. Plus, I think yours is _riiiight—“_

“Do _not_ touch my asshole right now!” Iwaizumi shouts.

Oikawa breaks into hysterical laughing, and Iwaizumi rolls off of him, hiding his face in his hands.

His phone’s timer goes off.

“Fuck!”

 

*

 

After two months, he’s cleared to begin _light_ volleyball practice. This means he does a modified version of warm-ups, participates in stretching, and gets to toss in for spiking practice.

“Why can’t I do serve practice, too?” Oikawa whines to Coach.

Before he can respond, though, Iwaizumi is there. “No jumping, Assikawa!” he scolds. “You know Yamada didn’t clear you for anything that requires jumping, squatting, or running! So you’ll do what you’re told and you won’t complain about it, or I’ll make your life hell. Understood?”

“Why are you so scary, Iwa-chan?” Oikawa asks with a pout.

Coach rolls his eyes. “You do your physical therapy _exactly_ as directed, remember? That was our deal. He says no running, jumping, or squatting, you say ‘Yes, sir.’”

“Yes, sir,” Oikawa whines, letting his head drop in defeat.

Coach walks away to talk with the reserve setter Takeshi, whom Oikawa has been coaching for the last few months that he’s been out.

“Look, we just want you to be healthy, alright? You can’t rush this. You can’t just push yourself and pretend that everything will be okay. Do this right, okay?”

“It’s so frustrating though! I’ve been cleared for practice, but not really. How is this any different than where I was at before?”

“Hey, you’re allowed to toss in,” Iwaizumi reminds him. “You get to actually join the team for a couple of drills, you can get your hands back on the ball, practice the arms and hands part of your toss. I know you’re frustrated, but if you do this right, it’ll all be worth it, yeah?”

“Iwa-chan, I need a hug,” he pouts.

“Are you five?” Iwaizumi complains with an eye roll, but he moves towards Oikawa anyway, pulling him in for a quick hug.

“Now come on, it’s time to stretch.”

 

After practice, Oikawa’s muscles feel sore in that used-too-much way, but for the first time in months, it’s not from PT, but from _volleyball_.

Iwaizumi sees him rubbing at the incisions on his knee, still tender.

“Want me to massage out the scar tissue tonight?” he offers.

“Mm, yes please,” Oikawa says.

The skin on the outside appears to be mostly healed, though the scars are still a bit reddish. Underneath though, lies three little clusters of scar tissue that ache something awful when he does too much. Ice helps calm it down, but the most effective thing is to massage it out.

“You have to press in there pretty hard, in a sort of X motion,” Yamada had explained. “A couple strokes on one diagonal, then switch to the perpendicular diagonal.”

It’s hard for Oikawa to massage them himself, because he tends to tense up his muscles when he tries it. Iwaizumi however, has strong hands, the patience of a saint, and happens to be very, very good at making Oikawa relax.

They situate themselves on the couch with the jar of cocoa butter, Iwaizumi on one side with Oikawa’s legs in his lap. Oikawa wriggles his hips a bit to settle in, and Iwaizumi snorts.

“Comfy?” he teases.

“Yes, very,” Oikawa replies.

Iwaizumi dips his hand into the cocoa butter, coating Oikawa’s knee in the lotion. It makes the skin smooth and easier to massage, and has the added bonus of smelling really good.

“Mmm,” Oikawa hums as Iwaizumi’s fingers begin to rub his knee. Of the three, the highest incision on the inside of his leg hurts the worst. Yamada said that was common, that it tended to build more scar tissue for most people.

Iwaizumi focused his attention there, starting gently, but digging in deeper with each stroke.

Oikawa hisses a bit as Iwaizumi’s fingers press in harder and harder.

“Relax those muscles, keep breathing,” Iwaizumi says quietly. He expands his strokes up Oikawa’s thigh, to give him a breather from the pain and relax him again.

Oikawa shivers, but does as he’s told, putting his hands on his stomach and pushing the air in and out of his lungs methodically.

“Good,” Iwaizumi praises, and he shortens his strokes back down to the scar site.

When Oikawa tenses again, he brings his other hand up to Oikawa’s thighs, rubbing the smooth skin there at the same time as he massages the tenderness of the scar tissue.

Oikawa knows he has to press hard, otherwise it won’t really break up the scar tissue, but it hurts. Every time he thinks it might cross the line from painful to _stop_ , though, Iwaizumi relents, drawing back his fingers to a different scar to massage.

After a few minutes, they’re really starting to get into a rhythm, Oikawa thinks, when Iwaizumi’s hands start to branch out. He’s still rubbing his legs, but no longer focused solely on the scars. He drops his head down to pepper soft kisses up his shins, over his knees, up his thighs, skipping over his groin to his stomach, his chest, his collarbones…

“That tickles, Hajime!” Oikawa laughs.

Iwaizumi nips at his neck, and the giggle turns into a gasp. “Oh,” he says.

Iwaizumi chuckles quietly by his ear. “Can I take your shirt off?”

“Only if you take yours off, too,” Oikawa whispers back.

“Deal,” he says, and removes his shirt in one swift motion before taking Oikawa’s off in a similar fashion.

“God, you’re beautiful,” Iwaizumi tells him, arms placed on either side of Oikawa’s face to hold himself up, and Oikawa blushes.

He’s been called attractive by dozens of people, but the compliment means more coming from Iwaizumi. He _knows_ he looks good—spends a lot of time making sure he looks good—but hearing Iwaizumi call him _beautiful_ is something he will never get tired of.

“My handsome Iwa-chan,” he replies, turning his head to the side to drag his lips along one of Iwaizumi’s forearms.

Iwaizumi lays down on Oikawa, bodies flush from knees to chest, and Oikawa smiles. He loves the weight of his boyfriend on top of him, loves how warm and secure and heavy he feels. He runs his hands up and down Iwaizumi’s bare back, feeling the muscles and smooth skin there.

They stare at each other for a moment, just drinking the other in, and Oikawa licks his lips.

Finally, Iwaizumi brings their faces together, kissing Oikawa deeply. Though Oikawa does his best to take control of the kiss, Iwaizumi isn’t giving up so easily: it’s Iwaizumi’s tongue that pushes into Oikawa’s mouth, and Iwaizumi’s teeth that nibble at Oikawa’s lips.

Just when Oikawa thinks he’s gaining the upper hand, Iwaizumi rolls his hips down into Oikawa’s.

Everything stops.

They pull back, and Oikawa opens his eyes. Iwaizumi is already staring at him, searching for discomfort or disproval or a ‘no’ of some kind.

They’ve never really made it past this point, because someone always gets nervous and makes a joke or ruins the moment and neither is quite willing to cross the line.

This time, Oikawa doesn’t feel nervous—or rather, he does, but it’s the kind of nerves that push him forward instead of hold him back.

He feels sleepy and warm, relaxed from the massage Iwaizumi had been giving him, and the look of arousal in Iwaizumi’s eyes is enough to give him the courage to grip Iwaizumi’s hips and roll his own back with a little sigh.

Iwaizumi gasps back, whether in surprise or sensation, Oikawa doesn’t know or care.

The only thing he can think of right now is the electric thrill of Iwaizumi’s hardness pressing into his own, the liquid fire of their mouths gasping into each other, and Iwaizumi’s name.

Oikawa moves his mouth to Iwaizumi’s jaw, more moving his lips over the skin there than actually kissing him as his breathing gets more ragged.

There’s no rhythm, not really, though they somehow coordinate their hips well enough.

Hands are everywhere, touching bare skin wherever it can be found, mouths are open and panting.

Iwaizumi’s thighs are slotted between Oikawa’s, somehow not bothering his knee, so he pushes it to the back of his mind so he can focus on the rising heat in his dick.

Iwaizumi’s hand slips between them, dipping beneath Oikawa’s sweatpants band, gripping him with shaky fingers.

Oikawa moans, and suddenly everything is too much. He grinds his hips up as hard as he can into Iwaizumi, gripping his ass with more strength than he thought he had left.

Iwaizumi picks up the pace of both his hips and his hand on Oikawa, and Oikawa feels his legs start to shake.

“Don’t stop, don’t stop, don’t stop, _Hajime,_ don’t stop don’t—!”

Oikawa can’t breathe as he comes, Iwaizumi’s hand stroking him through it. When he comes back into himself enough to remember that he needs oxygen, he paws at Iwaizumi’s pants, wanting to return the favor.

He’s far less coordinated than Iwaizumi was, but neither of them seems to care. 

Iwaizumi comes with a groan on top of him, smothering Oikawa’s mouth again as he rides it out. They kiss sloppily for a few moments, hands and tongues a mess.

“Shit,” Iwaizumi breathes.

Oikawa’s heart is still beating too fast, so he doesn’t say anything, just licks the sweat off of Iwaizumi’s neck.

He revels in the salt on his tongue, then licks into Iwaizumi’s mouth to share it.

“Fuck,” Iwaizumi whispers again. “Tooru…”

“Hajime,” he finally says.

“That was, fuck, that was so much better than I thought it would be. I was so nervous…”

“Mm, me too, a little bit. But… Iwa-chan is so good with his hands,” Oikawa purrs.  

“Shit, are you trying to kill me?” Iwaizumi asks.

“Never. You’re not allowed to leave after that.”

“It was just—“

“I can’t wait to blow you,” Oikawa whispers, and Iwaizumi sputters.

“How can you say that so casually?!” he cries, untangling himself from Oikawa on the couch. “I’m getting a washcloth, you menace.”

Oikawa grabs his hand as he walks away, kissing it gently. “I love you, Hajime.”

“Me too,” he blurts. When it sinks in that they just said they loved each other, though, Iwaizumi all but sprints to the bathroom for a washcloth.

When he comes back to the couch, Oikawa is stretched out like a cat in the sun, waiting for him.

He cleans him up, trailing kisses after the damp cloth.

“Finish your homework fast, Hajime,” Oikawa tells him, “and we can go for round two.”

Iwaizumi smacks him with the washcloth across his abs.

“Mean, Iwa-chan!”

Iwaizumi laughs.

 

*

 

After three months, he begins lunges and squats, and less limited volleyball: no jump serves, and he has to take it easy on agility things, but he can almost set like normal.

“Good to have you back on the court,” Takeshi tells him. “I think the guys were missing your tosses. Mine just aren’t as good.”

“You’ve made so much improvement, though, Take-chan!”

“Still. We’re happy that you’re recovering so fast.”

“It doesn’t feel very fast,” he mutters.

“You had surgery, and you’re almost back to full-play after only three months. That’s pretty awesome. My brother had elbow surgery, and he couldn’t pitch even a little bit for six months.”

“Six months?” Oikawa asks. “I would have died.”

“Don’t be so dramatic, Shittykawa,” Iwaizumi butts in.

“It’s been four months since I did a jump serve, though,” he continues. “I’m still not cleared for jumping.”

“But you can set again, for real, not just toss-ins, but real setting!” Takeshi reminds him.

“Yeah, there’s that.”

“And didn’t Yamada-sensei tell you that if all continued to go well, you could start your return-to-run in three weeks?” Iwaizumi adds.

“Thanks, guys. I guess I should be thankful I can do this much so fast, at least.”

“That’s the spirit. Now come on, I want to see you and Iwaizumi do some quicks!” Takeshi says eagerly.

“That, Take-chan, I can do.”

 

*

 

After four months, he’s cleared to start a return-to-run program, which firmly kicks his ass, and jumping.

He starts with walking on the treadmill, then he gets to jog for thirty seconds, and then walk again for two minutes. He repeats this for twenty minutes.

The muscle along his shin that helps lift his foot up is sore, and his prior anger at his muscles not cooperating is back.

“I’m so weak, Iwa-chan!” he whines on the treadmill in the second week of his return-to-run sequence. “I can barely make it a full minute of running because my stupid leg won’t lift my foot high enough!”

“Are there any other strengthening exercises we can do for that muscle group?” Iwaizuimi asks.

“Ask Yamada-sensei, not me,” he pouts.

 

Jumping is almost as awful, but for different reasons: he’s _scared_.

Logically, he knows that Yamada wouldn’t ask him to jump if he wasn’t physically ready. But there he is, standing on a small trampoline, frozen in fear that he won’t be able to land. He fears the pain, he fears re-injuring himself as he has so many times in the past.

They had been doing shallow squats for a couple of weeks now, as preparation for jumping. Those aren’t so bad, because it’s just felt like muscle training: Getting strength back, testing his limits.

On the trampoline, though, he feels that this is somehow higher stakes. Squats don’t require any impact, and he could manage them before his surgery (though they definitely hurt).

Iwaizumi didn’t come to this session, because he had a group project, and Oikawa is about ready to chicken out when Shimizu comes over to check on him.

“Have you tried it yet?” she asks.

He shakes his head.

“Don’t do a real jump, first. Don’t even let your feet leave the trampoline surface. Just kind of bounce for a moment. Show yourself that it’s safe,” She says. He wonders how she knows that’s why he hasn’t jumped yet, but then he realizes he certainly can’t be the first patient she’s seen afraid of an exercise. “Then, when you’re ready, you can try to jump just a little bit. This week, it’s not about power and height: it’s just getting it done.”

“But what if I—“

“You can’t think like that. Would you like to hold my hands while you bounce? I can steady you,” she offers.

“Um,” he deliberates. He wants to do this on his own. No, he wants to do this with Iwaizumi. “Can’t I just… try again next week?”

“Yamada-sensei wouldn’t ask you to do something he didn’t think your body could handle. Just bounce for me. Just once. If it’s painful or too scary, you can come down. But right now, you’re letting your fear stop you.”

It’s probably the most he’s ever heard Shimizu speak, but he respects her, and agrees to try. He tries to steel himself, to push the fear down, but as he starts to bend his knees, he panics.

“Nope, can’t do it.”

“Oikawa-san, may I ask you a question?”

“Huh?”

“Before you had surgery, you were still playing. You were still jump-serving, even. What did you do then, to tell yourself to jump even though you feared the landing?”

“I wasn’t thinking about the landing,” he replies immediately.

“No?”

“No, I was way too focused on the toss, hitting the ball to get the placement right, supporting my team. I couldn’t afford to think like I would fail, or I would have probably collapsed.”

“That’s a bit extreme, I think, but the idea is the same. Would you like a volleyball? Maybe that will help you focus on something more positive.”

“I can’t serve in here; I’ll break something,” he says bashfully, rubbing the back of his neck.

“Then take my hands, and I’ll steady you,” she says assertively, holding her hands out palms up.

For a split second, he feels the same kind of energy from Shimizu as Iwaizumi tends to give off: steady, sure, and able to lend strength to those they trust.

Oikawa reaches shaking hands out to take hers, and when she gives him a slight nod of reassurance, he squats _just_ slightly, and then straightens up as fast as he dares. He bounces lightly on the trampoline.

“Good job, Oikawa-san. Try again now.”

He repeats the action, taking less and less time in between squats until he is bouncing rhythmically, his knees absorbing the tiny bit of shock as he “lands,” and he’s almost giggling, smiling down at Shimizu.

She smiles back, and Oikawa sees why the boys at Karasuno were so protective of their manager. She really is something special.

Someone special.

“I can’t wait to show Iwa-chan,” he says, a smile stretched wide across his face.

“He’ll be very proud of you.”

“This week, gentle wobbles on a trampoline. Next month, jump serves!” he exclaims, and feeling brave, he lets go of Shimizu’s hands and actually jumps—just enough for his heels to leave the trampoline’s surface—but he lands just fine, and he thinks that maybe he really is going to be okay.

 

*

 

After five months, he can run, jump, and serve like he wants to, but for one, beautiful difference: _it doesn’t hurt anymore._

He “graduates” from physical therapy, and he’ll deny to his death that he cried and hugged Yamada at his last session.

“I don’t want to see you in here again, you hear?” Yamada jokes with him. “Take care of yourself, Oikawa-san.”

“Thank you, Yamada-sensei, for everything. I know I was kind of a brat.”

Iwaizumi snorts at his side, but adds his own gratitude. “Thank you for allowing me to sit in on so many sessions.”

“I’m very glad that Oikawa had such a dependable friend to help him through this. The home program really does make the difference in recovery time.”

They bow respectfully, and head out of the physical therapy office for hopefully the last time, ever.

 

On the court, he’s nearly unstoppable. He fatigues a little earlier than he used to still, but his strength is coming back faster than even Yamada predicted. He follows his training plan to the letter, never skipping sets but not adding extras, either, and he’s connecting to his teammates and and learning what they need from their setter flawlessly as always.

He hasn’t felt this happy since high school, he thinks, after Seijou crushed Karasuno in their first match-up. He had felt validated and strong, beating his genius kouhai Kageyama. He feels validated and strong now, playing among his college teammates, together with Iwaizumi.

 

*

 

It is very strange to be “healed.” Oikawa’s knee has gone from a major, destructive force in his life to a memory, preserved only in the three small pinkish scars that mar his skin. It’s like this horrifying dream now that it’s not a living nightmare. He can run, walk, jog up and down stairs, and execute his killer jump serve without having to worry about if this one will be his last.

He doesn’t have to take so many pain-killers that his mother worries he will destroy his liver.

He doesn’t have to wear a knee brace, though he still does, out of habit, for volleyball.

“It’s my signature look, Iwa-chan!”

“You’re such a dumbass,” Iwaizumi replies.

“But I’m _your_ dumbass,” Oikawa tells him, leaning in for a kiss.

“Yeah, I guess you are,” Iwaizumi says, before meeting him sweetly for a moment.

Oikawa’s grin breaks their kiss, and he laughs.

They clasp hands, and walk toward the convenience store.

With a mischievous smile, Iwaizumi squeezes Oikawa’s hand. “Last one to the mini-mart has to buy,” he says, starting to pick up his pace.

Oikawa lets their hands drop and turns to his boyfriend with a fierce grin.

“You’re on.”

 

*

 

_fin_

**Author's Note:**

> replace "iwa-chan" with "mommy" and that's exactly what I did when I woke up from surgery. i have no recollection, only the second-hand shame my mother and nurse brought upon me
> 
> kudos and comments are always appreciated-- wish me luck on my ankle surgery next week lol  
> *edit*: ankle surgery went really well! i'm stuck on my ass for a while but should heal up real nice
> 
> thanks for the good vibes, friends!
> 
> find me on tumblr and ko-fi as ricekrispyjoints, if you're into that kind of thing
> 
> come find me on tumblr as ricekrispyjoints if you're into that kind of thing


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